Pete Barrow column: Another great idea for Christmas presents for football mad youngsters

Amongst the plethora of Christmas present ideas is one that claims it could help produce a new generation of successful England strikers.

According to the press release ‘Open Goaaal’ is the way forward for young footballers.

Seemingly those lucky enough to have goalposts in their back garden are plagued by the nightmares of ‘fetching missed shots, damaging garden fences and angering neighbours’.

These are problems that largely passed me by as a youngster as, when I was growing up, we generally would head for the nearest recreation ground or patch of grass to get a game started.

This had a number of benefits to developing as a young footballer in that you weren’t just shooting in and had to take on both attacking and defending aspects of the game, while learning that when the bigger lads joined in it could get a bit physical – plus if you did miss with a shot it was expected that you had to go and get the ball, which kind of taught you a lesson as well as keeping you fit.

But to go back to ‘Open Goaaal’ what we are dealing with here is: “A net designed to help young players build confidence to shoot firmly into the corner of the goal without fear of missing.”

Apparently the easily stored roll-away curtain is backed by coaches as it stops young players ‘shooting safe’ at the middle of the goal as the ‘Open Goaaal’ rebound net will be there to return the ball.

It sounds fantastic, so long as England are aiming to produce a generation of strikers who can shoot into the corners having slowly waddled into position because they have never had to do any exercise chasing missed shots when they were youngsters.

For those of you lucky enough to have a garden big enough you will be pleased to know that you can purchase the ‘Open Goaaal’ net for £139 for standard size or £149 for the large size – which is probably very useful if you are having Chris Waddle round for a penalty shootout competition.

If you have a smaller garden perhaps an old pair of net curtains rescued from the loft might serve the same purpose – and prove a little cheaper.