1. Juninho Known as the magnificent 7, Juninho was the best when it came to scoring from a dead-ball situation. The former Olympique Lyonnais legend and mid-fielder scored as many as 77 goals from set-pieces. Juninho is considered the greatest free-kick taker of all time. He was also the inventor of the knuckle-ball technique shoots as well.
2. Pele The king of football, Pele has scored 70 goals from set-pieces. Pele could bend the ball both ways with fierce power. Moreover, his immense game knowledge to out-think the goal-keeper helped him net the ball more often than not.
3. Victor Legrotaglie The Argentine from the 1970s is considered to be the greatest player in Mendoza football. Along with his stunning shooting ability, Victor was known for his 12 Olympic Goals for Argentina as well. There is a stadium named after him in Argentina.
4. Ronaldinho The magician from Brazil was brilliant from any position. Ronaldinho had everything. Hence, having the skill to net the ball from e a distance was in his armoury as well. Ronaldinho had scored 66 goals from set-pieces in his career.
5. David Beckham The famous phrase, “Bend it like Beckham” suggests how good Beckham was when it came to scoring from a free-kick. Beckham has a total of 65 goals from set-pieces in his career. His free-kick to take England to the 2002 FIFA World Cup is still cherished as one of the best moments in English football.
6. Diego Maradona The legend of Argentine football is one of the best in the history of the game. Maradona scored nearly 20% of his career goals with free-kicks. His free-kick against Juventus for Napoli is known as the ‘Divine Free-Kick’. Diego scored 62 goals from set-pieces in his career.
7. Zico Brazilian legend Zico scored 62 free-kick goals in his career. He was very accurate in his shooting skills. Zico is considered one of the world’s best players of the late 1970s and early 1980s. The attacking mid-fielder was very accurate with his kicks. Along with his accuracy, his languid run-up was very famous in his era.
8. Ronald Koeman The former Barcelona player and manager is known as one of the highest-scoring defenders of all time. The Dutch defensive midfielder also had his share of success with Ajax. Koeman has scored nearly 25% of his goals with free-kicks. He is one of the high-scoring defenders in his era. Koeman scored 215 goals in his career.
9. Lionel Messi There is hardly any football top 10 attacking list or records where you will not find the Argentine maestro named Lionel Messi. Although, before 2014, Messi was not considered as prolific from the dead ball, he has just proved everyone with his free-kick record since then. Till now, with his first goal for PSG from the dead ball, Messi has scored 60 free kick goals. 51 off those have come for clubs he has played and 9 for Argentina. More than that, Messi now has scored a free-kick in every 16.5 match, which speaks volumes for his accuracy from the dead ball position.
10. Rogerio Ceni To the shock of everyone, Ceni was a goal-keeper and he has scored 59 goals from dead-ball situations in his career. Ceni is the highest-scoring goal-keeper in the history of the game. He has scored 131 goals in his career. Except for one goal, all of them came from penalties and free-kicks. The Brazilian played for 25 years, most of that for São Paulo.
