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Penalty Kicks and Game Theory

17:57 recording · EN · 4 speakers

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Brief overview

Penalty kicks are a game theory contest: the least predictable side, not the best kicker, wins.

  1. Unpredictability beats accuracy from the penalty spotKickers must sometimes shoot their worse side, because always choosing the better one makes them readable.
  2. Penalty data turned a lottery into preparationIgnacio Palacios Huerta built a database of thousands of penalties from the 90s; by the 2000s teams were commissioning reports.
  3. A report only helps if you stay randomChelsea shot to van der Sar's left every single time in 2008, and he worked it out before Anelka's kick.
Executive Summary AI
  • The episode opens on Lionel Messi missing a penalty, noting that the top World Cup scorer of all time is a slightly below average penalty kicker and is in the running for the most World Cup penalty misses.0:12
  • Stefan Schmeinski, a retired University of Michigan professor and Soccernomics host, explains that every kicker has a good side and a bad side, so a kicker who always shoots his best side becomes predictable and must sometimes deliberately shoot his worst side — a mixed strategy — and professional footballers turn out to be very good at producing those random sequences.2:07
  • Economists once doubted mixed strategies because lab subjects paid a few dollars could not randomize, until Ignacio Palacios Huerta studied real penalty shooting and found the choices of penalty takers almost exactly match the theory.4:29
  • Simon Cooper recounts the 2008 Champions League final in Moscow, where Palacios Huerta's report for Chelsea told Peter Cech not to move when Cristiano Ronaldo paused in his run-up — Cech dove right and saved it — but every Chelsea kicker shot to Edwin van der Sar's left, van der Sar pointed left before Nicolas Anelka's kick, Anelka hit it mid-height to van der Sar's right against Ignacio's explici7:34
  • Today every top team carries a penalty report, goalies tape crib sheets to their water bottles, teams practice with piped-in crowd noise, and the old 60% advantage of shooting first may no longer exist — with more shootouts than ever possible as 32 teams enter the World Cup knockout rounds.12:23
Key Quote
“The top World Cup scorer of all time is actually a slightly below average penalty kicker.”
— Jeff Guo0:15
Key Quote
“Everyone who takes a penalty has a good side and a bad side, almost everybody.”
— Stefan Schmeinski2:07
Key Quote
“What's happening here is that both sides are in a mirror image situation.”
— Stefan Schmeinski3:28