How to Do a Rainbow Kick in Soccer

Video Transcript

"Hi, my name is Guillermo Gomez. I coach youth soccer. Have you ever seen someone do a rainbow kick? A rainbow kick is actually when somebody puts the ball behind, when the ball is right between your legs and you kick it behind you, kicking the ball over you. It's called rainbow because it actually, the ball travels in a shape of a rainbow. Normally when you are having fun with your friends at the park, you want to do these kinds of tricks for the enjoyment of the game. That's what soccer is all about. To have fun. In a regular team or a formal game, coaches would prefer you not to do that because they don't always work and sometimes they break their rhythm of play. At any rate, it doesn't mean that if you're good at it you shouldn't do it. To explain to you how we do a rainbow kick, first let me start by using my right foot, which I'm going to refer to as my front foot and my left foot is going to be my back. What I'm going to do is put my front foot, which is my right, I put my heel right next to the ball, okay, and then with my back foot, which is the left, I lock the ball with the inside of my shoe laces. I'm going to lift the ball about three inches up and then as I'm moving in a forward motion, I kick the ball with my right heel, going up so the ball can go right up behind my back on top of my head and receive it in front of me. Okay. So, to capture again, to summarize, I use my heel of my right foot, put the ball right behind it. I lock the ball with my back foot,which is my left foot. Lock the ball. Lift the ball with my left foot up a little bit, while I kick the ball upwards with my heel of my front foot so the ball can go up and in front of me. That's how you can do a rainbow kick."