An hour after the final whistle has blown on Sunderland 1-0 Middlesbrough, Chris Rigg re-emerges onto the pitch where he has just settled a local derby with a piece of improvised magic, a backheel from nowhere that has made a stadium gasp and a national audience take note.
The netting has been taken down and Sunderland’s groundsmen are mowing the grass noisily behind Rigg, but the boy who was 17 in June agrees to be taken back through his brilliant moment with The Athletic.
Even he seems slightly surprised when talking us through it, but then a winner of this type is a dream, an instinct, it’s not the plan.
The 24th-minute goal originates with Sunderland’s goalkeeper, Anthony Patterson, and by the time his long pass out is with Romaine Mundle on Sunderland’s left, Rigg is in the centre circle readying himself to move forward.
“Probably just follow in,” he says when asked what is going through his mind at this point. “Because I know when Pat gets the ball he likes to shoot. And sometimes you get lucky. And I got lucky there. Just follow in.”
Pat is Patrick Roberts, Sunderland’s left-footed right-winger, who has been found by Mundle. When Roberts takes possession, he runs at the defence and shoots, as Rigg expects.
The expectation is moderate as the ball is drilled low and into the Boro defence. But Rigg is still running.
George Edmundson sticks out a leg to block the shot and diverts the ball back towards goal. Goalkeeper Seny Dieng is wrong-footed and prostrate on the ground. The ball is loose.
Following in, as he says, Rigg gets to it first. How was his first touch?
He smiles at its imperfection, then demonstrates with a roll of both feet how he tried to regain control. “It takes the ball away from the ’keeper,” Rigg says of the first touch. “It was the only thing I could have done because it dropped right in front of him, so I had to take it away from him. I was like ‘Aw, no, I’ve took it too wide’.”
And then? “Then the only thing I could do was backheel it.”
It was not the only thing. The ball was bound for the goal line, the angle was narrow and at best it looked as if Rigg could keep it in play. But then he produces a backheel on the run. Not many would think of it, never mind perform it, especially someone who turned 17 three months ago playing against men in front of 43,000 fans.
Chris Rigg, take a BOW! 🔥 pic.twitter.com/jwCquWElwG
— Sky Sports Football (@SkyFootball) September 21, 2024
17-year-old Chris Rigg with a lovely back-heel goal for Sunderland 😱 pic.twitter.com/O1tI5cdIhP
— CBS Sports Golazo ⚽️ (@CBSSportsGolazo) September 21, 2024
“It went in, I was buzzin’ after that,” he says as watches the footage of his team-mates jumping on him.
“How cool is that? How cool is that?” shouts the commentator on Sky Sports.
We ask if he has done that in training. Rigg laughs: “I’ve not, nah, I’m not even that good in training.”
Another angle of Riggy’s back-heel… why not? 🎬🤩 pic.twitter.com/xYuYhC1iUL
— Sunderland AFC (@SunderlandAFC) September 22, 2024
Self-deprecation will take him far, so will self-confidence. Rigg speaks of how he first joined Sunderland aged five and of first playing on the pitch as half-time “entertainment” with the under-nines: “That was unbelievable. I was probably more nervous then.
“It’s just so good to do. Even though it’s half-time and it’s half empty, that’s what you dream of as a boy, to play in a stadium in front of fans.”