Seattle, where I live and work, is hosting the World Cup. Tens of thousands are gathering, paying thousands to watch matches like Belgium vs. Egypt or the USA vs. Australia. As players like Christian Pulisic weave through defenders, millions like me will find our eyes drawn to the live exhibition of a designed masterpiece: the human foot.
The human foot is beautiful and versatile. Dance shows off its beauty, and football, aka soccer, its multifunctionality. The most famous plays in the sport’s history would not be possible without the amazing ability of the foot to reconfigure, stiffen, become flexible, tilt inwards and outwards, and pivot right or left.
In 1986, Diego Maradona, an Argentine soccer prodigy, scored what is considered the greatest World Cup goal ever. How? Through rapid ankle movements. Maradona had perfected ankle control that enabled constant, subtle changes in his foot angle. This allowed him to keep the ball within inches of his foot while accelerating during the famous 11-second run, evading five defenders and the goalkeeper.
Biomechanically, Maradona relied on repeated plantarflexion—the powerful push-off motion practiced in calf raises—for explosive acceleration. He coupled this with rapid ankle inversion (tilting of the foot inward), which is anatomically allowed by four stabilizing ligaments. These aspects of foot design enabled the sharp directional changes he made without losing balance or speed.
To understand this as a biologist, I stare at a foot cadaver image on my laptop. I see a minimalist structure with a compact assembly of 26 bones, 33 joints, all bootstrapped by a network of ligaments, tendons, and connective tissue. Every bone and ligament seems part of the whole, yet the pieces and connections allow the foot to be flexible, absorbing shock and changing movement.
Three skeletal arches in the foot create multiple options for the ideal three-point contact with the ground, delivering tripod-like stability whether a player is standing on two feet, one foot, or even on the toes. This design naturally positions the player’s center of gravity over the center of the three-point base, greatly enhancing balance and control throughout every phase of soccer play.
I look away from the cadaver image to my own foot and remember that certain evolutionists, who believe the foot was clumsily cobbled together by blind natural forces alone, have labeled the human foot a “disaster.” They’ve called it “the most obnoxious example of bones for which we have no use.” Injuries, such as my own torn exterior ankle ligament, often get cited as evidence.
Yet watching replays of magnificent soccer moves provides an antidote. Another famous ankle skill, the "Cruyff Turn,” was debuted at the World Cup by Dutch footballer Johan Cruyff. He pretended to pass the ball with a powerful kick, but then used the inside of his foot and a rapid ankle inversion to reverse the ball behind his standing leg.
In the Cruyff Turn, the whole body must sell the fake shot, then reconfigure in milliseconds. The power for the initial “fake” comes from plantarflexion of the foot. This is followed by a midair reconfiguration and subsequent ankle inversion, which allows the inside of the foot to scoop the ball behind the standing leg. This reverses the direction of the play, catching the defenders off guard.
Some have said the foot is poorly designed, but does a design cease to be a design simply because it has limitations? Despite completely tearing my own ATFL ligament—which I was told would likely never fully reconnect—an ultrasound shows it has reattached, and I have recovered almost all of my range of motion. I’m fascinated by the mystery of its repair. How did the torn ends find each other?
The human foot is far from indestructible, yet it enables feats of agility, endurance, and power that no prosthetic system can match. Perhaps limitations are not evidence against design, but an inevitable consequence of balancing competing demands.
Stuart Burgess, a top British engineer and advocate of intelligent design, has argued that claims of poor foot design often stem less from biomechanical analysis and more from the expectation that evolutionary processes should produce imperfect structures. He should know. Burgess has himself developed a prosthetic foot!
As you watch matches over the coming weeks, consider a few questions. In the context of an elite football sporting competition, does the foot appear poorly designed? If the human foot is well designed, what would that imply about its origin? Can highly optimized systems arise through unguided evolution, or is intelligent design a better explanation? Be curious. Ask hard questions. And marvel at the ingenious design of the human foot.
Emily Reeves is a research scientist at Discovery Institute with a PhD in Biochemistry & Biophysics. She is a biochemist, metabolic nutritionist, and systems biologist who works with the greater scientific community to promote integration of engineering and biology.
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