Whose fault was one of the worst own goals ever? Allow us to over-analyse

Get your questions in for Alan Shearer, who is holding a Q&A from 3pm (GMT) where he’ll discuss England, the Premier League title race and who should go to the Euros

“Keep it tight early on lads, don’t do anything silly… oh for f…”

Before Tuesday night, Liechtenstein had lost 24 straight games.

The run included a 9-0 defeat to Germany, a 7-0 horsing from Iceland and a 6-0 loss to Cape Verde. Just last week, the Faroe Islands beat Liechtenstein 4-0. They had scored twice in those 24 games: one a stoppage-time consolation against Andorra, the other in a 2-1 defeat to Bosnia & Herzegovina.

So when they played a friendly against Latvia in Cyprus this week (no, we’re not really sure why either), their opponents’ head coach Paolo Nicolato may have felt he didn’t have to emphasise the classic mantras about keeping things simple and avoiding careless mistakes.

Maybe he’ll revise his pre-match team talks from now on.

The game was only 14 seconds old when Latvia defender Marcis Oss scored one of the quickest and most calamitous own goals you’ll ever see. It’s quite difficult to judge whether it was the actual quickest ever — records for international friendlies are somewhat scant — but if you can find evidence of any that have been scored before the 14-second mark, do let us know.

Oss, a defender for RFS in the Latvian capital Riga, might find some solace in the fact that this wasn’t exactly the most high-profile game of all time. He will probably see the moment the ball crossed the line every time he closes his eyes for the foreseeable future, but beyond some short-term humiliation and this being the first thing that comes up when googling his name (until he discovers a cure for the common cold or starts a controversial podcast or something), it certainly isn’t the end of the world.

It is harder to escape the slapstick nature of the own goal, however. This wasn’t an unfortunate deflection or an attempted clearance gone awry: at its most basic level, Oss simply passes the ball into his net.

However, as the following excessive over-analysis of the goal will show, there are some other places he could point the finger of blame. Was this own goal really his fault?

It all starts with a coordinated kick-off routine. Sort of. The ball is played back to Liechtenstein midfielder Livio Meier, who miscontrols it initially, before taking another touch and launching it towards the left flank.

His team-mates rush forwards, including left-back Max Goppel, just out of shot in the screenshot below, suggesting this was all part of some grand plan. These sorts of things are very much en vogue these days, with two goals scored inside the first 10 seconds of two matches last week, by Austria and Germany, via similar plans. So could Oss point to smart coaching by the magnificently named Liechtenstein supremo Konrad Funfstuck? Most certainly.

Verdict: this part was not Oss’ fault.

This could all have been prevented early on, had one of Oss’…