Football: Galatasaray striker Mauro Icardi misses gift open goal after clever penalty move

Galatasaray SK striker Mauro Icardi will be wishing social media didn’t exist this morning.

The Argentine was set up for what appeared to be a gift goal by teammate Kerem Akturkoglu, who had stepped up to take a penalty kick. Instead of putting his laces through the ball, the 24-year-old deftly laid the ball off for Icardi who was rushing into the box.

The keeper was completely wrong-footed, diving to the right and leaving the left hand side of the net gaping for Icardi to tap the ball into the net.

Almost unbelievably, the former Paris Saint-Germain player sent the ball wide and into the into the advertising boards for a goal kick.

The clip has swiftly done the rounds on social media, with fans likening it to some of the worst open goal misses.

“My mother would have scored that,” one X user wrote.

It was not all lost for Icardi and Galatasaray, however, as just five minutes later he again linked up with Akturkoglu to score what would eventually be the winning goal.

The penalty miss is not the first time Icardi has been in the news for the wrong reasons - the 30-year-old had a widely-publicised affair with former Sampdoria teammate Maxi López’s wife Wanda Nara and even had López’s kids tattooed on him.

The first time Icardi’s club at the time Internazionale played Lopez’s Sampdoria - the match was named the ‘Wanda Derby’ after Lopez refused to shake Icardi’s hand.

Argentinian legend Diego Maradona said at the time that Icardi was “dead to him” following the affair.

Icardi and Nara have since separated following a turbulent relationship.