Rabona

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In football (soccer), the rabona is a move in which a shot, pass or cross is performed by moving one leg behind the other (the one taking the player's weight) and kicking the ball forward with the first – effectively with one's legs crossed.

There are several reasons why a player might opt to strike the ball this way: for example, a left-footed striker advancing towards the goal slightly on the right side rather than having the goal straight in front may feel that his shot power or accuracy with his right foot is inadequate, so will perform a Rabona in order to take a better shot. Another scenario could be a left-footed winger sending a cross while playing on the right side of the pitch without having to turn first. A good example of this is Diego Maradona, who often made use of this move for both short and long passes.^{[citation needed]}

Another reason why a player could perform a rabona might be to confuse a defending player, or simply to show off his own ability – as it is considered a skillful trick at any level. Famous players who have performed the Rabona are – Roberto Baggio, Ricardo Quaresma - performs it probably on the most regular basis and has a high success rate, Cristiano Ronaldo, Diego Maradona,Walter Gaitán, Robinho, David Villa, Zlatan Ibrahimović, Alessandro Del Piero, Zinedine Zidane, Rivaldo, Francesco Totti and Ronaldinho. On 21 August 2005, defender Dave de Jong scored the late equalizer in the german cup game between VfL Osnabrück and Greuther Fürth with a classic rabona.^{[citation needed]} In a game in the swedish first league between Örebro SK and IFK Göteborg, Andres Vasquez scored a goal with a rabona from just outside the penalty box, and Ante Milicic also did a rabona.

Although this move become popular in recent times, it was first introduced by the Italian player Giovanni Roccotelli in the 1970s, for Ascoli Calcio. At that time this move was simply called a "crossed-kick"^[1]^[2].

The rabona is also a dance step used in the tango. The dance step takes its name from the football kick^[3].