Like high-rise architecture, Britpop and Twitter, plastic football pitches made everyone feel very modern and oh so pleased with themselves when they first came out. But like high-rise architecture, Britpop and Twitter, it was not long before it became apparent that plastic football pitches were dreadfully regressive, systematically ruining everything they purported to be trying to improve – society, music, society, sport – an empty epoch, a despicable sham.

The football played on plastic pitches during the 1980s was egregious reductive nonsense, the surface immediately giving the artless a morally dubious advantage over the artisan. In 1989-90, for example, a poor Luton Town side could boast a better home record than both Manchester United and fifth-placed Chelsea, yet on their travels from plastic-clad Kenilworth Road, had the second-worst away record in the entire division and only stayed up on goal difference.

Speaking of Luton, here's a little karmic payback for all those sides turned over on the special surface at Kenilworth. Roy Wegerle has put the home side one up with as good a piece of pure striking skill as you'll see, a simple shift inside from the left and a pinpoint belter into the bottom-right corner, Aston Villa's goalkeeper Nigel Spink given no chance. But late in the day Spink launches a long punt upfield, forcing Marvin Johnson into a panicked attempt at a backpass as the ball rears up erratically. The resulting arc, looping over a perplexed Les Sealey, is as unnatural as they come. Or, indeed, as the pitch itself.

But for proper nuclear-power karmic retribution, full-scale fire-and-brimstone stuff, look no further than the greatest tournament of them all. After 116 minutes of a tumultuous 1986 World Cup quarter-final, Brazil and France were tied at 1-1 and facing penalties. It was at this point that Michel Platini stroked a pass down the middle to set Bruno Bellone free on the Brazil goal. The goalkeeper Carlos, about to be rounded on the edge of his area, raced from the box and embraced both Bellone and moral turpitude, intricate samba rhythms making way for Oi! music. Carlos should have been sent packing, but the referee Ioan Igna merely shrugged his shoulders and waved play on.

Brazil had survived to make the penalty shoot-out, but the reckoning was not long in coming. Bellone was one of France's penalty takers, and he dispatched his effort against the bottom of the right-hand post. Unfortunately for Brazil, the ball came bouncing back inside, whereupon it met the back of the diving Carlos, who had guessed the right way but was way too late. The ball pinged back into the net, justice done. The freakiest goal in a major international fixture.

Or was it? Because the 1978 World Cup threw up two humdingers to compare, though neither of them led to success for the lucky recipients. The tournament was only a day old when Italy scored a classic of the kind in their opener against France, Roberto Bettega redirecting a wild sliced shot on to the woodwork with his head, before Marius Tresor's clearance ricocheted towards Paolo Rossi, who eventually prodded home. Italy had conceded in the opening 40 seconds of their campaign, but this goal settled their nerves and sent them on a journey that would take them to within 41 minutes of the final, Holland eventually seeing them off with two long-range rakes.

Potentially more crucial was the goal hammered in by the splendidly monikered Roberto Dinamite in Brazil's final game of the second group stage that year. The player had been drafted into the team midway through the tournament over the head of the manager Cláudio Coutinho by the CBF's technical committee, and for once the suits seem to have made a decent decision, the player scoring twice in a 3-1 win over Poland. His second came at the end of an amazing sequence, the Polish post being hit twice by Mendonça and the crossbar once by Gil within the space of a few seconds, before our man exploded into action and fired the ball into the net. The goal meant Argentina had to score at least four goals in their final game against Peru to reach the final, and we all know how that ended up, rendering Dinamite's goal effectively a damp squib.

What goes round comes around: this is fast becoming a theme of the freaky goal, and a slightly disconcerting one now we come to think about it. Here's Tim Flowers being hoist by his own petard after hacking lumps out of his own penalty area in order to orientate himself. Stan Collymore advances towards the area and unleashes a shot at a speed that would shame a pensioner playing carpet bowls. No matter: just before the ball reaches the waiting Flowers, it rears up off one of the keeper's divots, over his shoulder, and into the net.

Later in the year, Steve McManaman hit another David Bryant-style effort against Tottenham, a lame effort that bucked up off the surface just before it reached the diving Ian Walker and apologetically settled into the net. "It's all thanks to our portable divot," laughed the manager Roy Evans, knowing full well Liverpool's luck was in, but would no doubt come back to bite them on the buttocks at some point. It took a while – nearly 13 years, in fact – but Liverpool finally found themselves on the receiving end with Sunderland striker Darren Bent's infamous billiard shot off a beach ball and past a heel-rocking Pepe Reina.

Collymore, incidentally, was never the most self-aware of players, but at least he had the good grace to look sheepish when his effort went in. Compare and contrast to the shameless Bent, who raced off as though he'd just recreated Eddie Gray's second against Burnley in 1970, only using a house brick while wearing slippers.

This is just stupid.

Roberto Dinamite's strike apart – and his was a standard-issue culmination to a strange move, rather than a freak scene of its own – all our goals have been scrappy affairs. We finish with a real peach, though, a once-in-a-million outcome that was both skilful and aesthetically satisfying.

Perfectly timed, too. England had been suffering a hellish 1995, which started with the Lansdowne Road riot, followed by a dire goalless draw at Wembley against Uruguay in March. Come the summer, and the four-team Umbro Cup tournament, a dress rehearsal for the following year's European Championships. They didn't start well for England, who required a late winner to see off Japan. Then, in their second game, they went 2-0 then 3-1 down against Sweden at Elland Road, and with two minutes to go were facing their worst defeat on home soil since the infamous thrashing by West Germany in 1972.

Paul Gascoigne set David Platt up to ensure England avoided that ignominy, and then in the final throes of the game, Darren Anderton stepped up and lashed a shot towards the left-hand side of goal. The ball twanged off the post, flew in mid-air along the route of the goalline, hit the right-hand post flush, before spinning into the net at speed.

England would still take time to improve for Euro 96 – indeed they didn't find anything approaching top gear until 135 minutes of their tournament had elapsed – but this strike snapped the nation out of its depression and gave it a sense of wonder again. A geometric pleasure, one of the loveliest goals ever scored by England.