How hard is it to take a free-kick?

As anyone who's ever played the sport of football knows, it is incredibly difficult, especially if you're attempting to score a goal.

To ripple the back of the net from a dead-ball situation requires a significant amount of skill, even more so at professional level.

Few players at the very highest level of the sport ever fully master the craft and some even struggle to test the goalkeeper from outside the box.

So surely an average person would likely fail to even get the ball on target in a professional setting, right?

Well, while that would usually be the case, there was something of an anomaly back in 2014 during a game between West Ham United and Tottenham Hotspur at Upton Park.

West Ham vs Tottenham

During the match, a pitch invader entered the fray while Spurs were lining up to take a free-kick and he managed to get to the ball and strike it goalwards before security could stop him.

And to be fair to the fan, his left-footed effort wasn't bad at all and it at least forced West Ham's goalkeeper into making a save.

That was more than Spurs' Christian Eriksen achieved with his shot after security stepped in and allowed play to resume...

Video: Pitch invader takes better free-kick than Eriksen

Eriksen's wayward effort went soaring over the crossbar, much to the delight of the West Ham fans inside the ground.

So there you have it, once in a blue moon, a regular person can (kind of) take a better free-kick than a highly-paid professional.

Spurs had the last laugh that day at Upton Park, though. The north London outfit won Mauricio Pochettino's first match in charge 1-0 thanks to a dramatic 93rd minute debut goal from Eric Dier.

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Kyle Naughton was sent off in the first half for handling the ball inside the penalty area, although Mark Noble was unable to convert the resulting spot kick.

West Ham were reduced to 10 men themselves in the second half when James Collins picked up a second yellow card for a foul on Emmanuel Adebayor.

Dier's late winner then capped off an entertaining, incident-filled day at Upton Park.

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