AP

“The ball is round” is just about the worst cliche in football. It means the game—and life by extension—is unpredictable.

Unpredictable? Just ask goalkeepers at the European Championship. For every major tournament — be it World Cup or Euros — a new ball is produced — ever more high-tech, ever more sophisticated. And invariably, scientists claim, ever more perfect.

One result is totally predictable with the new Europass ball: controversy ensues.

“Those balls are going all over the place, changing direction all the time, especially if fired from a distance,” Croatia goalkeeper Stipe Pletikosa said.

As usual, goalkeepers are convinced everybody is out to get them, make them look like a fool.

“They are not designing balls for goalkeepers,” Netherlands goalkeeper Edwin van der Sar said, referring to the technological wizards at Adidas who designed the white ball with the black patches.

With the new Europass, Adidas touts “revolutionary Thermal Bonding Technology” and “new PSC-Texture surface structure.” It also raves about a “unique outer skin that improves power transmission.”

The hype has always been thus. But when Adidas presented its Teamgeist ball for the 2006 World Cup, France great Zinedine Zidane put it in a more understandable context: “When you kick it, it goes in the right direction.”

Flippant enough, but goalkeepers are not amused.

Compared to the 2006 ball “they’re even faster this time,” Sweden goalkeeper Andreas Isaksson said of the Europass that sometimes whizzes by during training.

Add to that Adidas’ admission that the ball “creates greater swerve,” and it becomes a heady mix for the last defenders of the goal line, whose one error can mean a whole nation is kicked out of the championship.

“It’s strange. You never know what it’s going to do,” said Czech Republic goalkeeper Peter Cech, who is considered one of the world’s best.

It further feeds goalkeeping paranoia, something that has stuck to goalkeepers like a tight glove for years.

“Everything that is new in football today is to hurt us,” Portugal goalkeeper Ricardo said. “Nothing is done for our benefit.”

Fans might see a lot fewer goalkeepers floating across the crease, their outstretched hands confidently plucking the ball from the air as it heads toward the upper corner.

Instead, there might be a wild dash with flying fists just to punch it out.

“You have to be brave to try to hold onto the ball. You really have to be happy just to stop it from going in,” said Jens Lehmann, the goalkeeper for tournament favorite Germany.

“Maybe I’ll punch more often instead of trying to catch it. I don’t want to look for excuses,” said Juergen Macho, who is expected to start for co-host Austria.

Even field players have been watching the ball fly with amazement.

“It can change from moving left to right at every moment,” Poland midfielder Mariusz Lewandowski said. “You can see for yourself that it does weird things.”

New balls have certainly added a jolt of excitement in the past. The 1990 World Cup was seen as a turning point, a low-scoring tournament that made officials realize a touch of spice would add goals and excitement. And ever since the 1994 tournament produced the Questra ball, detractors have been out to ridicule every new ball.

Complaints about boring, scoreless games, though, have gone down. Some say griping comes specifically from players who have links with Adidas’ competitors.

At 37, Van der Sar has already seen too many strange balls to worry much. When Ajax played smaller Dutch teams in the early 1990s, they would all try to befuddle the champions.

“They would pump up their balls really hard. Or they were, like, bigger than normal. It is always something. Don’t think too much about it. Get on with it,” Van der Sar said.

In the halcyon days of soccer, when leather still looked like it came off a dead animal, stories abounded of balls being soaked in water for days to make them extra heavy to surprise opponents. Woe to the forward who inadvertently headed a ball like that.

Some balls have even become legendary. Stories abound that for the maiden World Cup in 1930, Argentina and Uruguay could not agree what ball to use. Lore has it each team could use its ball for one half.

With its ball, Argentina raced to a 2-1 lead at halftime, only to see the Uruguayans bounce back with their ball to win the final 4-2.

Science has put an end to all that; the progress continues.

“Adidas also intends to unveil more revolutionary innovations in match ball production for the UEFA, FIFA and [African] competitions,” the German company said.

Goalkeepers beware, the worst is yet to come.