Pretty bad when this season has shown it’s much easier to score a penalty without a crowd putting the player off.
A few penalty shoot outs ended like 13-12 already this season.
Even though Grigg scored a fair few, think it was nearly half his goals the one season he scores 20ish was never that confident he would score as a lot of them the keeper got close to. Regards O Connor the keeper never got close to any of them, they were usually in the net before keeper dived!
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Even though Lavery’s penalty found the back of the net yesterday, it was far from being a gem and I’m still not convinced he’s the right man for the job.
At the other end of the pitch, much has been made of Roberts lack of success in saving penalties, which is a mystery because shot stopping is the best part of his game; although to be fair Barrow’s penalty was well taken.
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Good enough to pretty much earn him his move, sure 10 of his 20 goals that season were penalties - good old Febian Brandy eh
I wish someone would pass these ideas to DC regarding penalties.
The goalkeeper should never move before the penalty is taken. He can move like a tennis player to get up on his toes, but never move sideways.
If so, any sidefoot penalty down the centre can be caught. If kicked with power down the centre it might be blocked.
If there is no movement, any sidefoot penalty low and more than a couple of feet from the posts and no more than 4 feet off the ground might be saved.
If the taker knows the keeper will do this he will have to aim high and wide. Any kick within a couple of feet of the posts or bar will risk missing the target.
That leaves something like a square meter for the taker to target. Much more difficult than rolling the ball in after the keeper has dived the wrong way!
Every Walsall player should study videos of Alan Buckley taking penalties. As I remember most or all of his kicks were aimed 5 or 6 feet off the ground and aimed at the stanchion supporting the net. If he hit that spot no keeper could save the kick.
Our record of scoring and saving penalties is pretty aweful.
Yeah, my brother was a goalkeeper at Leeds back when the likes of Alan Smith was coning through and he says they were always taught to never move before the penalty is taken.
In training they’d have him face the other way and then to turn around once you hear the penalty taken and then dive, you’re probably never going to save it but it’s teaching you to watch the ball I suppose.
Too many goalkeepers just make a decision before, then don’t even dive, they just seem to drop left or right as if they’d already accepted it’s going in.
I thought that was abandoned after italia 90, when Germany scored all their penalties against a static Shilton.
In short it dow work against good penalty takers.
It might still be a valid strategy for league 2 to be fair.
Germany did their homework on Shilton. England did not do their homework on Germany.
To be fair those penalties Germany took were all pretty good pens. The taker is always the favourite before the ball is kicked. The ones we missed, one hit the keeper and the other hasn’t landed yet.
Etheridge was one of the best in recent times when it comes to saving penalties. He had a technique where he waited until the very last second to make his move, at which point he relied on his speed across the line and reach to keep spot kicks out.
An example that sticks in my mind is one that he didn’t save. It was against Northampton at home in 16/17 in the last minute. Whilst the actual kick was hilariously bad, he waits and waits whilst the taker has no cue about where he is going to dive.
(Skip to 1:50 for the pen)
Did it have an effect on the ball ending up on the M6? Maybe not, but it’s interesting to compare that technique with Roberts (who I actually think is one of the better all round ‘keepers at this level).
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I remember Cutler saying that Etheridge had analysed penalty taking in great depth and worked on the idea that the taker could move his legs around but it was the angle of his hips at the moment the kick was taken that determined where the ball would go.
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Interesting post.
The hips don’t lie
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Argument for our designated penalty taker to be kitted out in old-fashioned very baggy shorts perhaps?
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The penalty that Lavery took on Saturday was how it should be done. No show boating, just run up to the ball and hit it.
I think kickers and goalkeepers are overcomplicating this simplistic task.
Here’s a novel idea to stop conceding goals from penalties.
DONT GIVE THEM AWAY IN THE FIRST PLACE
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Something else we have to work on alongside corners 
Can’t see it catching on…
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One word: DISCIPLINE!
Paul Jones should be employed by the club as penalty taker coach. Anyone remember his two conversions on a crazy night against Blackpool in 87-8?
A panenka penalty chip, Colin Taylor style.
Just f*****g lamp it.
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