Soccer is a simple sport. Kick a ball around and try to get it into your opponent’s goal using anything but your hands (actually, in soccer your ‘hands’ technically extend from your your fingertips all the way up to your shoulder. Where the shoulder meets the chest is a bit of a ‘grey zone’ that will be at the referee’s discretion as to whether you used your ‘hands’ on the ball or not). The only player on the field who IS allowed to use their hands is the goalkeeper (one for each team). The limitations on them is that they can only do so within their own penalty box, which extends 18 yards from their goal line and is about 44 yards wide. While the 18 yard depth is an absolute size for all penalty boxes, the width may vary from one pitch (or field) to the next. While being able to use their hands is a tremendous advantage for goalies, you have to remember that there is still11 opposing players out there on the filed who desperately want to get that soccer ball in behind them and into the back of their goal. Other than their hands and their cunning timing, the only bit of equipment that a goalie has to help their defensive task is a pair of soccer goalie gloves.
Goalie gloves usually have the palm make of a latex foam material. Latex foam is used because it is somewhat tacky in nature, allowing the goalie to have a better grip on teh ball as it gets kicked at him or her as hard as possible, and often with quite a bit of spin on the ball too, making it tricky to get a handle on. These sticky, padded palms on the gloves help them to better do their job.
Another material that you might find on some goalie gloves is neoprene. This is the same material that is used to make wetsuits. It also has some cushioning properties, but it is slightly more durable and will last longer than the latex version. The downside is that you won’t have quite as much ‘feel’ on the ball as with the latex material. Neoprene gloves are often used in either very wet conditions or as training gloves so that the softer, more sure-handed gloves can be saved for more important moments such as the big game! Typically a goalie glove will also have a velcro and elastic cuff. This allows the glove to quickly and easily be adjusted and readjusted to make sure it is snugly around the goalkeepers hands. The last thing they want is a sloppy, loose glove flopping around on their hands when they need to make a big save.