Short corners have to combat a negative reputation in world football. Just as a back-pass is seen as an inherently negative manoeuvre, corners which are not crossed directly into the penalty area are often met with disdain by supporters worldwide. Sadly, this opinion is shared by too many managers in the virtual universe as well; by opting against putting the ball into the danger zone you instantly forego a greater opportunity to score seems too much of a common place.

In my eyes, when a team takes a short corner it may be a wise decision in terms of goalscoring opportunities. Taking a short corner by no means gives up an opportunity, but instead creates a new and different one. Especially when your team lacks an aerial presence, a short corner offers up new avenues to scoring a goal.

When the opposing defence is better at dealing with crosses than your team is at scoring from them, you have to change your tune. The short corner routine offers team with less physical prowess in terms of aerial combat a chance to score from set pieces.

When you lack strong players in the heading department, just hoofing the ball into the penalty area all willy nilly is the quickest way to lose the ball and perhaps end up on the receiving end of a devastating counter-attack. In these circumstances, a cross is more ‘putting possession up for grabs’ rather than a genuine chance at goal.

This new setup will offer you a genuine chance of passing your way towards a goal, instead of hoofing the ball towards the far post.

Because of some sort of glitch in the matrix, the player set to mark the opposing keeper often becomes a player left unmarked near the edge of the six-yard-box. This unmarked player can either swivel on the ball and find an unmarked team-mate or even have a cheeky crack on goal.

I accidentally scored a few goals like this when my initial corner kick taker was suspended and I forgot to set a new one. Due to some sort of weird glitch in the matrix, we scored a few goals like this. Sadly though, I was unable to replicate these goals regularly.

I took to Twitter with the basic setup of this corner setup, determined to crowd source a solution. After about a week of discussing solution, it was @DorkSirjur who finally came up with a working tweak, one that resulted in a more consistent distribution towards the free man.

Ultimately, I am not going to offer up a download link of the routine. You can see the instructions concocted by DS and me in the screenshot above, so it’s easily replicated. Hey, maybe you can even tweak this routine and come up with your own variations, that are even more effective.

If you do come up with a new routine, feel free to share it with me in the comments or on Twitter. Crowdsourcing new corner routines is always fun.

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Guido

Guido is the founding father of Strikerless and main nutjob running the show.