As I mentioned earlier, it definitely is about anticipation and judging the flight of this cross. Lineker is supposed to be, from what I have read, that kind of a striker -- an opportunist goalscorer, and for that type of striker, he should have seen this ball's flight from the beginning and launched to meet it first.
He seems to be moving too slowly to the ball and that reminds me of what I thought at the time which is that he was more worried about colliding with that goalpost than scoring that goal. He appears to be trying to glide toward the ball (leaving his feet way too early) so as not to impact with the goalpost when he should be crashing the goalline with all the speed he had at his disposal. He is jumping up, when the ball actually will reach him and the defender waist high. That is where he lost this race.
There are two ways Lineker could have met this ball: 1) he could leave his feet when he did but be diving almost parallel to the ground with maximum forward thrust to score spectacularly, or 2) to keep his feet on the ground and accelerate to top speed to meet the ball.
As an ace striker, he should have read the defender behind him and realized it was going to be a race to the ball.
John
