2026 оны Дэлхийн аварга шалгаруулах тэмцээн дэх торгуулийн цохилтын сэтгэл зүй

Geir Jordet is an industry-leading expert on penalties and the author of Pressure, a book about the psychology of shootouts. Jordet teaches and conducts research on psychology and elite performance at the Norwegian School of Sport Sciences and is part ofThe Athletic’s World Cup coverage this summer.

Penalty kicks, particularly under highly stressful World Cup conditions, are a great laboratory for studying human behaviour under pressure.

What do we know about the ways players, coaches and teams have conducted themselves for penalty kicks and during penalty shootouts in the 2026 World Cup so far?

First, some of the fundamentals.

In the 100 games before the semi-finals (i.e. excluding Mikel Oyarzabal’s penalty as Spain beat France last night), there have been 20 regular penalties, 14 of them successful and six missed.

A 70 per cent success rate on regular penalties, keeping in mind the small sample size, is unusually low. Before the World Cup, 535 players had registered taking penalties in senior games, with an 81 per cent average conversion rate. So, when it matters most, these players, on average, deliver their worst.

What about the penalty shootouts? We have had four of them, with 40 kicks, 25 goals and 15 misses. This gives a conversion rate of 62.5 per cent. That more goals are scored with regular penalties than in shootouts is quite common, probably a result of more specialist penalty takers taking regular penalties, and higher pressure on each kicker in shootouts.

Moreover, the 62.5 per cent success rate in penalty shootouts is also unusually low. The average success rate in World Cup penalty shootouts (since 1982, 39 shootouts, 360 attempts) is 69 per cent. Only the last tournament in the US, in 1994, was lower with 62.1 per cent. However, since the all-time high conversion rate of 78 per cent in 2010, there has been a trend of progressively fewer goals, and the current rate is only marginally lower than in Qatar 2022 (63.4 per cent) and Russia 2018 (66.7 per cent).

Let us go deeper and look at some trends and observations from these 60 penalty kicks on record so far…

Experience counts

A lack of skill and experience seems to have a negative impact on performance. In this World Cup, defenders have only scored 36 per cent of their penalties. We published papers on the liability of defenders in penalty shootouts 20 years ago, but teams are still using them in shootouts.

Another observation is that 10 players without any registered previous senior-level penalty-kick experience have featured. Only half of them scored. Australia’s Harry Soutar and Lucas Herrington are examples, both defenders, and both with no previous penalty record — both missing against Egypt. Another example is Jonathan Tah, who ended up missing decisively for Germany in their shootout against Paraguay.

Overall, players with some previous penalty experience (more than 10 kicks) have an average conversion rate of 75 per cent, while those with 10 or fewer have scored only 58 per cent. As one would think, players with little or no experience from the penalty spot, and in goalscoring situations, are probably less effective than those who have experience.

However, there are always exceptions, and sometimes they tell a richer story.

Staying with Germany, when Kai Havertz stepped up as the first taker in that shootout for Germany, he had previously scored 16 goals from 16 penalties. With this comes extra pressure, but more importantly, in my opinion, it gives opposing goalkeepers full access to data of previous kicks.

A goalkeeper-dependent penalty taker such as Havertz always observes the goalkeeper in the final stage of his run-up, looking for the keeper to commit early so he can exploit that with a shot in the opposite direction. For Havertz’s penalty against Curacao, the keeper indeed moved early, allowing Havertz a simple goal to his left. For the shootout a couple of weeks after, Orlando Gill, the Paraguay goalkeeper, had clearly studied Havertz, because he did not commit early at all, forcing the Arsenal forward to pick a side without knowing where the goalkeeper would go. Gill guessed correctly and saved easily.

Messi’s problem

Another exception is Lionel Messi: extraordinary player, ordinary penalty taker. Messi has missed his two penalties in this World Cup, against Austria and Egypt.

Anyone can miss one or two, but for Messi, there is a pattern. Before the World Cup, he had taken 132 penalties and scored 78 per cent of them. We always expect Messi to be above average, but from penalties he is below average.

Why?

Messi’s struggles from the penalty spot are not new. In February 2022, I wrote an article in The Times of London entitled “Lionel Messi, excuse my impudence, but here’s how to take better penalties”. In my book from 2024, I have a separate chapter called “The Messi problem”. Since then, he has consistently continued to deliver average penalty performances, scoring 75 per cent of his past 20 attempts.

Some people have argued it is a purely mental problem, that he does not deliver under this type of pressure. I don’t think it’s that simple. He has scored seven of nine penalties for Argentina in penalty shootouts, including two in the 2022 World Cup (in addition to a regular penalty kick in the final). When the pressure is on, Messi does not crumble, but rather continues to deliver his normal, relatively average, penalty performances. Normal is not bad. We just expect more from him.

Rather, I think his problems have to do with his penalty skill. Messi has every single one of the components that would build fantastic penalty-taking skill, but he somehow doesn’t put them together correctly.

In the past three or four years, he has started alternating his technique. Sometimes he uses a goalkeeper-dependent approach – observing the goalkeeper in the run-up (as he did against Austria); other times he uses the conventional goalkeeper-independent approach, deciding beforehand where to shoot (against Egypt).

This is a positive development, as it enables him to be more unpredictable for goalkeepers, and is consistent with some of the world’s best penalty takers such as Harry Kane, Robert Lewandowski and Oyarzabal.

Messi’s problem is that he is not great at executing either of these two techniques.

When he has decided beforehand, his precision and pace are decent, but not outstanding, meaning that if the goalkeeper picks the correct side, he will save it almost 50 per cent of the time. When Messi observes the goalkeeper, he uses a slow run-up, but no stutter movements to force the goalkeeper to react, which makes it easy for the goalkeeper to just remain standing, or even to take initiative with various fake movements, and the chance of a goal is lower than it needs to be.

I look at Messi and I see an artist, capable of producing the most sophisticated moves possible on a football pitch and make it all look so easy. A penalty kick doesn’t require an artist, it requires a carpenter; someone who reliably and monotonously gets the job done.

Bounou bluffs

Most of the penalty kicks (43 of them), in this World Cup have been conventional goalkeeper-independent kicks, where the penalty taker has decided beforehand where to shoot, and just aims to get it there with pace and precision.

In total, 65 per cent of these are scored, but if the goalkeeper moves correctly on these kicks, only 58 per cent are scored. This shows the chance component of penalty kicks — first, you do not know exactly which way the goalkeeper goes, and if indeed the keeper chooses correctly, the overall chance of a goal is just slightly higher than the chance of correctly guessing the flip of a coin.

Penalty takers generally favour their so-called natural side, where right-footed kickers shoot to their left and left-footed kickers shoot to their right. In the 2026 World Cup so far, this is what 56 per cent of the (goalkeeper-independent) penalty takers did, with only 28 per cent going to the other, unnatural, side, and 16 per cent to the middle. Goalkeepers obviously know this robust historical tendency, and they guessed the correct side for 58 per cent of the kicks going to the penalty takers’ natural sides, and only 42 per cent of the kicks going to the unnatural side.

The remaining 17 kicks in the World Cup have been the type of kick we covered above from Havertz, goalkeeper-dependent kicks. Although they have been equally successful as the goalkeeper-independent kicks, with 65 per cent success, these types of kicks reveal an intriguing game between the penalty taker and the goalkeeper.

With Morocco’s Yassine Bounou leading the pack, in this World Cup we have seen several goalkeepers actively taking control over goalkeeper-dependent penalty takers — including Croatia’s Dominik Livakovic against Harry Kane (although Livakovic moved early off the line, and Kane scored on the re-take, using another technique), France’s Mike Maignan against Norway’s Jorgen Strand Larsen, and Orjan Nyland striking back for Norway against Brazil’s Bruno Guimaraes.

These goalkeepers effectively nudge the penalty takers into believing they are committing to one side, when the truth is they are going to the other.

Their recipe consists of well-rehearsed fake movements that are displayed at exactly the right time, when penalty takers make their decision on where to shoot, which severely complicate the penalty taker’s plans, and then makes the second part of the job — stopping the shot — quite simple, relatively speaking.

Yassine Bounou pretends he’s diving one way, above, while Maignan does the same, below

In England’s round of 16 win against Mexico, Jordan Pickford tried the same strategy against super goalkeeper-dependent penalty specialist Jimenez (who has scored 37 of 38 penalties, using this technique).

Pickford first positioned himself skewed in the goal, visibly opening his left side, then started a seemingly fully committed and very believable early movement to his left, exactly at the time Jimenez made his shot decision. The skewed position masterfully gave Pickford less distance to cover when he stopped his fake movement to return to his right, but his fake was too real. The initial movement had gone so far to one side, he had no chance of making it back in time.

Jordan Pickford pretends to go to his left before Jimenez strikes the ball…

… before stepping off his left foot to go the other way…

… and can’t make up the ground

A penalty kick is a hotbed for mind games, and although this World Cup has not got as far as Qatar 2022, yet — we still have not seen Argentina No 1 Emiliano Martinez’s antics — a few of the goalkeepers have shown their dark, disruptive and manipulative side.

Those in the World Cup who have engaged in some active and visible disruption against penalty takers have let in 58 per cent of goals, while the well-behaved, stationary and silent goalkeepers have let in 79 per cent. The more intense these disruptive behaviours, the more pronounced the impact. This may have helped goalkeepers such as Switzerland’s Gregor Kobel against Davinson Sanchez and Morocco’s Bounou against half of the Netherlands team.

Bounou also successfully stopped Kylian Mbappe’s penalty in the quarter-final. His movements on the line may seem random or arbitrary, but they are not. He knows exactly when Mbappe looks at the goalkeeper in his run-up, and this is the point he delivers a sudden movement that Mbappe cannot help but see and somehow be affected by. The key is to provide a signal that stands out in all the noise.

There are, of course, no guarantees that mind games work. When Norway’s Nyland was up against Brazil’s second penalty taker, Neymar, after saving Guimaraes’ shot in the first half, he unleashed everything he had. The otherwise peaceful father of three first stole the ball from the Brazilians. Then, the fluent Spanish speaker (after his time in Sevilla) engaged Neymar in a conversation in Spanish, where the back-and-forth lasted more than 20 seconds.

Neymar came out on top from the penalty spot, but Nyland won the game.

Nyland and Neymar have a discussion (Photo: Timothy A. Clary/AFP via Getty Images)

The sample size is obviously small, but that there is an impact on the penalty takers is consistent with existing research on larger samples, showing that goalkeepers’ distraction behaviours can shave off 10 per cent of the penalty takers’ conversion rates.

Something that shows no relationship to outcome is VAR waiting times.

Many spoke at length about Mbappe’s unusually long wait before his penalty against Bounou and Morocco, but players who have waited a long time for VAR do not score fewer (or more) goals than players who waited for a shorter time. Besides, Mbappe’s 187-second wait (from foul to whistle signal to take the penalty) was not even among the longest waits in this World Cup (I will get back to the kick with the longest VAR wait later). Even though Mbappe stood waiting for quite a bit, and ultimately missed his shot, it was not necessarily the time itself that disrupted Mbappe.

I am a huge admirer of Mbappe, in general, and under severe pressure. Contrasting his penalty, and the game as a whole, against Morocco to the one against Paraguay, not only did he score his Paraguay penalty, but he behaved very differently in those two games. Against Paraguay, he responded to many of the opponent’s disruptions with a shoulder-shrug or sometimes a smile. Against Morocco, Mbappe appeared more frustrated.

So it is not the wait itself that is the problem, it is what players do with it. For the penalty in the Morocco game, Mbappe received the ball from his team-mate too early, he started his routine too early, and he put himself into the final stage of his shot preparation too early. Hence, when it all got disrupted, with the referee intervening about his placement on the penalty mark, Mbappe showed clear signs of frustration.

This frustration indicates that the outside moment has reached in. This does not mean a player cannot recover, but he was not able to do that here.

Team tactics

Performing under pressure is not just an individual performance; it is a team performance. Morocco played the collective penalty game well in the penalty shootout against the Netherlands, when everything centred on the brilliant Bounou.

First, after his successful shot, Soufiane Rahimi walked over to his goalkeeper and the two of them shared a long hug, forcing the next Dutch penalty taker, Wout Weghorst, to wait, while momentarily being outnumbered in the penalty area. When Rahimi let go of the hug, he made sure to walk right towards Weghorst, even laying a hand on him, instead of what would have been a more respectful and less disruptive path around the striker.

Secondly, when Ismael Saibari entered the penalty box for his kick that ultimately sealed the win for Morocco, he was initially greeted by his goalkeeper, who handed him the ball. This is not new; several teams involve the goalkeeper in this way. However, most goalkeepers then run out of the box as soon as they can, while Bounou, interestingly, simply strolled with the penalty taker towards the goalkeeper, effectively creating a two-vs-one situation against Bart Verbruggen.

Outnumbering the opponent in a situation like this obviously has no direct functional performance value, as it would in any other tactical situation in a game. With that said, if one agrees that a penalty shootout is a psychological game, the value of these subtle cues of dominance (and submission) cannot be underestimated.

Decoy drama

A strategy that has become very popular in recent years is the decoy penalty taker, where, upon receiving a penalty kick, a team-mate of the real penalty taker grabs the ball and pretends to be the upcoming penalty taker. If the illusion is successful, the decoy serves the purpose of attracting attention from opponents aiming to distract the penalty taker, while the real penalty taker can quietly prepare in the periphery, calmly focusing on his kick.

Another function of the decoy is that the goalkeeper cannot know for sure who the upcoming penalty taker is, and with the importance of data about penalty takers these days, if you can give the goalkeeper as little time as possible to consult notes and prepare for a specific taker, this brings more advantage.

Sometimes, the decoy is supplemented by, or combined with, a penalty-spot protector, whose purpose is to prevent the opponents from kicking up the penalty mark to disrupt the grass before the kick.

Ousmane Dembele is the decoy as a Paraguay player tries to scuff the spot

A decoy was used for half of the regular penalty kicks so far in this World Cup. The combined decoy/penalty-spot protector was used for 15 of the 20 kicks, of which 73 per cent were scored. In those five instances where neither of these strategies were used, three goals were scored (60 per cent).

This sample is so small it is meaningless to use as a way to declare these strategies successful, but decoys and spot protectors are now the norm for penalty kicks at this level.

The best penalty so far…

The most extraordinary penalty performance under pressure in the World Cup so far, in my opinion, was Youri Tielemans for Belgium, in the 124th minute of the round-of-32 game against Senegal. With the score 2-2, a goal would cement a spot for Belgium in the round of 16. A miss would send the two teams to a penalty shootout.

This time, Senegal did not collectively leave the pitch in protest against the late penalty kick (as they did in the AFCON final against Morocco earlier this year), but they understandably did what they could to create chaos. This included one of their players poking a finger into the ear of the Belgian penalty-spot protector Diego Moreira, and responding to the reactionary elbow to the tummy by going down, and staying down, on top of the penalty mark.

Chaos before Belgium’s penalty

The VAR and the chaos took a total of eight minutes.

That’s 480 seconds for Tielemans to wait for his high-pressure kick; more than twice as long as Mbappe had to wait for his kick in the Morocco game.

However, Tielemans did not act alone.

Throughout all the commotion, Romelu Lukaku acted as decoy, holding on to the ball, fooling everyone, including the TV producer, who pulled up a graphic showing his recent penalty record.

After Lukaku’s handover of the ball to Tielemans, it only took 20 seconds until the referee blew his whistle for the spot kick to be taken.

Facial expressions can certainly lie, but the close-up of Tielemans’ face shows a penalty taker who seems to be in a state of almost complete composure — relaxed gaze, slow breathing rate and peaceful but deliberate movements.

Youri Tielemans remains calm before the kick

This is not unusual. As a penalty taker, you want to adopt the mindset of feeling in control, because not having control (as coaches, team-mates, and fans will experience) is much more stressful, often triggering people to have to look away.

Side note: most of us have probably experienced a situation where we needed to look away from something stressful. I, personally, felt it last year, when I worked with Europe’s Ryder Cup golf team as a pressure consultant. My professional responsibilities ended the week before the event itself, so when the tournament started, I was a passive, though highly invested, spectator.

On the last day of the competition against the US team, the Americans had a huge momentum that almost saw them catch up to Europe’s large lead. It had been a long weekend, and at this point I had to take a little break and stand by myself in the parking lot for 20 minutes, because observing the action unfold felt too much to handle. Fortunately, I made it back to see Shane Lowry make the decisive putt to give Europe their first Ryder Cup away win since 2012.

But back to Tielemans’ penalty: when the whistle came, he took one last peaceful exhale, a calm and short run-up, and then buried his goalkeeper-independent kick perfectly in the top-right corner.

This was, for me, the penalty performance of the tournament so far, a perfect culmination of individual and collective coping efforts, under extreme conditions.

Additional data analysis: Sebastian Hoyvik Skjold