"To not spend time on that is very strange." That's Geir Jordet — professor at the Norwegian School of Sport Sciences and the world's leading authority on penalty psychology — talking about teams that still treat shootouts as an afterthought. At this World Cup, Germany and the Netherlands already know exactly what that negligence costs.
Both went out in the round of 32 on penalties. Germany beaten by Paraguay, the Netherlands dismantled by Morocco. Meanwhile Belgium's Youri Tielemans stepped up in extra time against Senegal, converted, and sent his country through. Same pressure, very different outcomes — and the gap between them isn't luck.
The science behind the spot kick
Jordet's research covers 718 shots from every men's penalty shootout at the World Cup, Euros and Champions League between 1970 and 2023. What he found wasn't random. Fifty-three percent of players who missed displayed the same cluster of behaviours afterwards: shrinking their posture, falling to the ground, hiding their face, cutting off teammates. The body broadcasts the mind's failure before the player even turns around.
One of the clearest tells happens before the shot. When the referee blows his whistle, some players treat it like a starting gun — sprinting mentally toward execution before they've controlled anything internally. "The ones who react to the whistle very quickly, that to me is not a particularly good sign," Jordet said. "It could indicate that their focus is basically on their emotions and not on the task at hand."
Kylian Mbappé is the exception that proves the rule. He's among the quickest penalty takers in the world — but speed is baked into everything he does on a pitch, so it reads as dominance rather than panic. For most players, rushing is a tell.
Bono's con and Ancelotti's rehearsals
Morocco goalkeeper Yassine Bounou — known as Bono — has turned the goalkeeper's role from reactive to predatory. Against the Netherlands, two Dutch players missed the target entirely, and Bono saved a third. His weapon is a double fake movement on the goal line, timed precisely to make the taker believe he's committing left when he's actually going right. It's worked against some of the best penalty takers in the world.
"Goalkeepers are more prepared," Jordet said. "So far in this World Cup, we're seeing how goalkeepers have gained a little bit of an edge by just being smarter than the penalty takers and using analytics and data better than what we have seen in the past." That shift matters enormously for anyone tracking shootout odds — a goalkeeper who's done proper homework is a significantly better bet to save one than historical averages suggest.
Brazil's Carlo Ancelotti is taking zero chances. He's been running full shootout simulations in training — two teams, players waiting on the halfway line, walking to the spot, going through the entire ritual — while he studies body language and tendencies from the sideline. Spain's Luis de la Fuente has been equally direct: "Kicking a penalty is not something that happens at random. Just as we have specialists in free kicks, in corner kicks, we have specialists in penalties. Not everybody can shoot a penalty."
England, under Thomas Tuchel, are running the same programme the FA built after losing six of seven shootouts in the 1990s and early 2000s. "The FA has a programme in place. We follow this programme in detail," Tuchel said. Whether those lessons have truly stuck is still the question England hasn't answered under tournament pressure.
Somewhere in this tournament, Jordet warns, a young player's entire legacy will be condensed into one missed shot from 12 yards. "That is a massive negative emotional trauma that we're inflicting on this player as a coaching staff, as an FA, and even as a football industry." The teams that have done the work are trying to make sure it isn't their player doing the falling.
