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Tuesday, July 13, 2021 - 14:43 SGT
Posted By: Gilbert

Paying The Penalty

It's coming Rome, indeed. Now that was a classic European final, i.e. England enters against a continental team and loses, prefably on spot kicks for that extra dash of savoir faire.

And it all started so brightly, too; United skipper Harry Maguire gave away a tactical corner two minutes in, leading to club teammate Shawberto Carlos smashing it in at the near post, just like that. With Top Right Messi having just broken his international curse at the Copas*, the Wembley set must have thought that an end to fifty-five years of pain might well be descending too. Italy were definitely on the ropes for some time, but England kept to the low-risk style that had seen them concede just the one goal - moreover not from open play - in the tourney thus far, and failed to press their advantage. And of course Italy equalize in the 67th minute, which had England... make next to no adjustments, despite the wealth of attacking talent screaming to run at the geriatric Italian centrebacks; yes, yes, Bonucci and Chiellini might not have allowed a single dribble past them in the tournament, but from how Chiellini had to haul Saka down by his collar, it couldn't have hurt to try?

[*Some had suspected FIFA being willing to find excuses to hold more special editions, until Messi got one; perhaps a sign that he can move on from Barcelona too, before he bankrupts them]


Swap shirts now? Or pants later?
(Source: altfriblog.vercel.app)
[N.B. The videos kept getting taken down for copyright claims]


Here, let us first acknowledge the enormity of what Southgate had accomplished: by defeating Germany, Ukraine and Denmark, his record of five knockout stage wins in major tourneys (World Cup/Euros) in total, is already two more than what any previous England manager had achieved. Sure, this could be interpreted as England simply being world-class underachievers historically, but it's still something. And yes, his strategy probably isn't the most adventurous, but it's not as if the likes of say Spain in 2010 (six of their seven World Cup matches won by a single goal) or Italy in 2006 (who coincidentally also did Germany 2-0, and Ukraine by three) were ripping their opponents up either. In international games, the players generally aren't too familiar with each other unlike in club competition (exceptions such as Germany/Bayern aside), and thus going for a defensively-sound system dominated by hardworking and disciplined players who will stick to their roles (e.g. Saka) - instead of shoehorning incompatible stars together, as with previous English sides - makes a lot of sense.

Still, it might be said that effectively settling for penalties against Donnarumma, with a close to 40% save ratio from the spot, might not have been the best of ideas, and that's before going into how England have historically had one of the worst records in shootouts (compare Germany) - which Southgate has painful personal experience of, in having his (pretty poor) take saved by Köpke in the semifinals of Euro 1996. But hey, new manager, fresh start, surely it's written in the stars for Southgate to finally exorcise those ghosts? As it was, Kane did his usual nerveless strike after Berardi converted, then Pickford saved off Belotti! Up stepped... Harry Maguire? Plenty of fans must have been scratching their heads, only for Captain Slabhead to absolutely thundercunt what was possibly the best penalty of the year thus far, destroying the camera in the top corner of the goal-netting in the process.

Even the most cynical and long-suffering typical England fan (including yours truly) must have had a flicker of real hope kindled at that. Bonucci scored next, but all England had to do now, was to polish off their remaining three kicks, to end a half-century of hurt. Up stood Marcus Rashford MBE, who sent Donnarumma the wrong way with his delayed hit... only to drive it right off the other post. At this point, there might have been a sinking feeling amongst the more-experienced English fans, that they had gotten the genre wrong. This was not some fairytale Bildungsroman in the making; it was a repeat horror-tragedy.

It was back to square one as Bernardeschi put Italy in front again, before Sancho struck a frankly not-very-good one just slightly left of Donnarumma, which got saved. Pickford had to save from Jorginho, which he impressively did, after the latter tried to roll it to the left post. All eyes then turned to the man to keep England's dreams alive, for the fifth and final regular kick: 19 year-old Bukayo Saka, who had by all indications never taken an official penalty at the senior level, in his life. He managed what was basically a fascimile of Sancho's effort, moreover perhaps the most naive "natural" placement, for a left-footer. And with that, Southgate had successfully passed the torch on, for the next generation.


Carrying on the sacred English tradition
(Source: redcafe.net, from the Daily Express)


Saka had barely broken down before armchair coaches crashed servers all over the Web, raging over Southgate's penalty-taker selections, and the senior players' perceived cowardice at leaving an all-but-teenager to shoulder the ultimate burden. Manchester United fans in particular were not entirely unreasonably upset at Rashford and Sancho being subbed on only for the penalties without a chance to warm-up, especially when it seemed that Maguire and Shawberto were locked-on as national heroes (both deservedly made the tournament's best XI, by the way). About this, my opinion is that having Rashford & Sancho on was actually probably correct, given that England had literally no other recognized penalty specialists available, other than Kane; Rashford had reportedly scored 13 of his 15 official takes - a very respectable 87% conversion rate - with Sancho three from three for Dortmund. On another day, Rashford would have pinged it in off the post, Sancho lifted it a yard or so higher, and the week-long revelries in Merrie Olde England would yet be ongoing, assuming the Jorginho save.

[Update 8th Sep 2021: It turns out that Shawberto was left out of the official UEFA team of the tournament; a shame.]

Of course, this leaves the Saka pick, which yeah, still looks inexcusable from where I'm sitting. If Grealish had volunteered - as he is claiming - only to be overridden by Southgate (with Villa fans suggesting some bad blood between the duo), I'd have to lay this one firmly on the manager, who has admittedly taken responsibility for his choices. As many have noted, cup final penalties are far more a confidence and belief thing, than a test of skill. At the professional level, one figures that these players, whether striker, wingback, Slabhead or goalkeeper, should be able to accurately place a stationary ball roughly whereever they want it, over a mere eleven metres. The primary factor, then, is picking the guys who won't let the occasion get to their heads, and wind up shooting not to miss rather than to score - as Sancho and Saka unfortunately did.

Here, we might as well delve into what makes a good penalty kick. To recap, the kick-taker simply has to propel the ball over the goal-line from a distance of twelve yards (approximately eleven metres), between goalposts set 7.32 metres apart, and the crossbar set 2.44 metres above the ground. This is, really, a pretty big target. Opposing him is the goalkeeper, who is not allowed to leave the goal-line before the ball gets kicked. From this, the odds are pretty clearly stacked against the goalkeeper, who is never really expected to make the save, no matter how good he is. This however also translates to a no-lose and lower-stress situation for goalies in shootouts: they won't be blamed for not making saves (well, unless they keep getting humiliated by gag efforts), and might well become a hero for a single stop.

Interestingly, only about 75% of penalties are converted at the professional level despite the taker's advantages, with this ratio remarkably consistent across the top national leagues. Players entirely miss the goal (or hit the post) only about 7% of the time, with the goalkeeper saving the remaining 17%. Now, there have been a plethora of techniques adopted by penalty-takers, ranging from ultra-long run-ups, to sudden pauses and weird stutter-steps (exemplified with the Zaza style), to try and entice the goalkeeper to commit to one side or the other. So the thinking goes, if the goalie takes the bait, scoring becomes all but guaranteed by just putting it to the other side. Goalkeepers nowadays do however have access to counter-research on well-known takers' habits (sometimes condensed into cheat sheets stuffed into socks) - which is perhaps an argument for putting unknown takers on - and can try their own psyche-outs too.


Up, lads, and have at it!
(Original source: dw.com)


However, statistical research seems to point to one simple truth: there's really no need for all that scouting, mindgames and funny prancing. All the taker has to do, is to get it on target and into the top one-third of the goal (i.e. a rectangle over seven metres wide, and some 80cm high), for a nailed-on 100% conversion rate. One might have read about how the top corners are literally unreachable, but it turns out that such precision is entirely unnecessary. In fact, just hitting it honestly into the top half of the goal retains a 97% success rate. The worst one can do, expectedly, is to aim bordering the bottom centre where the goalkeeper's crouching (as Sancho/Saka sadly did). Sure you can't miss and can look smart if the goalie commits prematurely, but on the other hand it gets saved 30% of the time.

Given this, one might wonder whether it is seriously that difficult for a professional player to train to consistently hit a 7.3m x 1.2m target (close in size to the proverbial barn wall) from twelve yards, but the evidence seems to bear out that it's really not that easy in real life, given the mere 75% overall conversion rate by specialists. Some might have managed it, though; while Germany's reputation from the spot is well-deserved, given their 87% record at major tournaments, the Czech Republic has apparently managed a perfect twenty from twenty under the same criteria, and the latest Europa League final (that United sadly lost) had 21 consecutive kicks scored, until De Gea (a goalie, for non-footy followers) had his attempt saved. Notably, United's first two takers Mata and Telles were brought on just for the shootout, so one supposes the lack of a warm-up shouldn't matter overmuch for confident takers.

Some mathematicians and economists have for their part argued that aiming for the middle makes sense under game theory, since both the taker and the goalkeeper should be expected to know the above statistics, and therefore the kickers should sometimes just place it straight at the goalie. To this, all I have to say is that if one of your guys starts spouting about mixed strategies before the shootout at the faculty games, you might do well to relegate him to be the last kicker in the lineup. Indeed, neuroscience suggests that the less one thinks about the kick, the better the outcome can be expected to be.

As to the griping on the order of England's takers, with one particular complaint about Kane and Maguire "frontrunning" to claim the first two kicks - supposedly lower-stress since the shootout can't be lost on misses that early on - I would have to mostly disagree. Of course, you'd ideally want a good taker to anchor the crucial fifth kick if it comes to that, but on the other hand, only the first three takers are guaranteed to have a go. Cristiano Ronaldo for example discovered this to his detriment in the Euro 2012 semifinals, when Portugal lost before it got to his turn. Now, I suppose you could perform some complex modelling to predict the best lineup by estimating each players' conversion rate under various conditions (e.g. when behind, when the last kick was missed, etc.) as parameters, but really it should be simpler to just have all your fellas stay back after training to drill on putting it into the top half of the goal?


Uh, technically not untrue, but next please
(Source: reddit.com)


Finally, it has been raised on various forums that Southgate might well have been tasked to have players of colour attempt the final few kicks, towards the in-your-face diversity agenda (more on this subject in the future). About this, one believes this mostly a coincidence because, as explained earlier, the first four takers were entirely reasonable picks under the circumstances, i.e. the English squad having very few established penalty specialists; on hindsight, Southgate might perhaps have considered recruiting a few such players (e.g. Jamie Vardy, Danny Ings, James Milner, Dele Alli, etc.) to the squad for just this eventuality, all the more given the unprecedented number of substitutions (five) allowed and his sparse usage of available squad depth in any case, but I guess maintaining traditions takes precedence.



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