Freestyle king Fagerli ready to open box of tricks for golden finale

LONDON : Erlend Fagerli admits his shooting leaves a bit to be desired and is not especially interested in fellow Norwegian Erland Haaland's exploits at European champions Manchester City.

But put a soccer ball at the feet of the 26-year-old and prepare to be amazed.

While goal-machine Haaland is ripping up records in the Premier League, Fagerli is the undisputed freestyle king and is preparing to challenge for a 10th world title.

Like his fellow freestylers, including his older brother Brynjar, Fagerli does not need to tackle, score a goal or run during his 'battles' which he likens more to the new Olympic sport of break dancing but with a ball.

Freestyle competitions typically involve two players taking it turns on a small circular court to impress the judges with uppers (tricks with the upper body), lowers (tricks with the lower body) and tricks while seated.

"The only thing in common with regular football is that we both use a ball and good ball control helps," Fagerli, who is defending his title at the World Freestyle Football Championship in Nairobi on Saturday and at next week's Red Bull Street Style Championships in Brussels, told Reuters.

Ball control is quite an understatement as Fagerli conjures a seemingly endless array of ways to keep the ball off the ground - including his signature move the Erlend Roll.

"That's where I kick the ball up and jump forward in like a front flip motion and roll it on the back of my feet and catch it sitting down," he explained.

Fagerli dabbled with playing in a regular team but when he watched videos online of freestylers he was hooked, spending hours imagining new tricks and then trying to perfect them.

"I train five or six days per week and its 95 per cent practising tricks that I