Penalties !!!

[bill taylors apprentice]

Before I start on where we are going wrong I accept football is a game of opinions and this not about criticising individuals.

We have missed the vast majority of our penalties this season, that's a fact! 
Numerous players have failed to convert, even Martin who has scored has a poor conversion rate, fact!

I believe Reading has a similar shocking record to ours but are penalties being saved across pro football more often than in the past? I have no facts to prove this but IMO it seems that way, so maybe the days of a very high success rate are gone.

Keepers can now move sideways before the kick, are more athletic, taller and better prepared than ever before, these are facts but I also believe refs are more lenient allowing movement forward by the keepers but that's an opinion.

The kickers conditions have improved with a lighter ball and better pitch to take it on but IMO the keeper has improved his chances slightly in recent times.

Some might say the pressure to score is greater nowadays as well and keepers having more belief, certainly than in the past when a goal was seen as almost guaranteed.

So, even if I believe scoring a penalty kick is not as simple as before our record still stinks and needs analysing and improving.

A successful penalty taker has always been about confidence and sound technique and that's not changed but with the gains made by keepers its more important the ever.

I'm not going to describe the perfect penalty because different players will do what works for them, players need to recognise what keepers can do today but its still about either out foxing them or shooting hard enough and far enough away from the keeper.  That's obvious I know but Martins (like so many of ours this season) was neither one or the other, not the worst I've seen but he scuffed it, it wasn't hard enough and not close enough to the post.

Most importantly (my opinion) he wasn't in control of the situation, didn't look confident, shaped to shoot left and did and if he had been in control he would have seen the keeper move early and guided the ball in the other side!

What I'm trying to say is we need a player who is calm enough to manage the whole penalty kick better from the moment he picks the ball up to the moment he kicks it. The way some of our players play you'd think we have a few but that's not been proved correct, its become a lottery and while its nice to be handed a free ticket its unlikely to be a winning one. 

Its not just about practice its in the head and that's why good penalty takers come in all shapes and sizes but I cant see one among the present lot!
Even just blasting it would be more successful than our current rate of failure but its likely to let you down at times.

The answer is having a player who has self belief coupled with sound technique, nothing new there but nowadays they have to copy the keepers who have worked out how to benefit from the marginal gains they use to reduce the chance elements and be mentally switched on through out the process.

Like the ruby conversion in front of the posts, the penalty kicker is holding all the best cards, if he fails its generally down to preparation and that's generally in his head!

Time for the sports Psychiatrist.

[filham]

OK but I don't think there is a lot of difference from the past. I bet Langley, Lock and certainly Tosh would find the net from the spot more often than not. Also McCormack made it look easy last season.
The hard fact is we have a team of nice  ball players without an outstanding shot among the lot of them. It is not only from the spot that our shooting is below par.

[FulhamStu]

The basic requirement is to hit the ball hard enough.  All our misses are because the hit was not good enough.

[RaySmith]

I have also thought that refs don't penalise keepers for moving like they used to - this often  caused a  pen to be retaken. Has there been a rule change? Keepers do seem to move before the ball is struck, anyway.

Hard and low is pretty effective usually, as Stu says, but a pen taker lacking confidence often seems to hit the ball too softly, for  fear of not hitting the target.

For me, it's a confidence issue. Berba and  Ross were two who  never seemed to miss, and they had that touch of arrogance and self- belief, and knew exactly what they were going to do when they stepped up.

No pro player should miss a pen or have it saved, but it seems to happen  a fair amount these days. Keeper moving plays a part I think, and lack of confidence  as far as Fulham is concerned - and this lack of confidence  also shows in all the chances we create but don't take.

[Apprentice to the Maestro]

The penalty misses show we don't have a natural goalscorer in the side or someone with a very cool head, ideally someone with both attributes.

For open play we need to fill that goal scorer slot and that might help with the penalties.

[Holders]

I thought as Martin set it up that he should go for a top corner but that takes guts as there's the chance of hitting it too high. A keeper can get to either bottom corner from where he stands as it's taken but not to the top ones.

[filham]

I wonder whether penalty conversions is a factor in Stats. Boys programme. If notit certainly needs to be considered for our next signing.

[cmg]

There's no doubt that we are currently suffering from a period of notably incompetent penalty taking.

However, I feel our perspective is a bit affected by the preceding period of rather impressive penalty taking.

Since the start of the PL (and I presume Championship stats are similar) some 1900 penalties have been awarded of which just over 1600 have been converted. That's a miss rate of about 16%.

McCormack had a miss rate of 0% for us (scored 8 out of 8) although his career miss rate is a much less impressive 25.5% (scored 26 out of 35). In other words McCormack is a below average penalty taker.

Berbatov was one of the top penalty takers. He missed 0% for us (6 out of 6) although career-wise he did manage to miss 2 out of 24 (8%)

Murphy only missed 2 (one of which he then put away) for us out of 19 and they were the only ones he missed out of a career total of 28 taken (7%).

Compared to this luxury Martin has scored 15 of the 23 kicks he has taken which is a pretty weak miss rate of around 34%.
Maybe we shouldn't expect too much of him...or find another penalty taker.

[westcliff white]

SLav said in his after match press conference that Martin will take the next one

[hovewhite]

Funny this season as we dont get 8 a season normally and when we do we mis um,sods law!

[MJG]

There's no doubt that we are currently suffering from a period of notably incompetent penalty taking.

However, I feel our perspective is a bit affected by the preceding period of rather impressive penalty taking.

Since the start of the PL (and I presume Championship stats are similar) some 1900 penalties have been awarded of which just over 1600 have been missed/saved. That's a miss rate of about 16%.

McCormack had a miss rate of 0% for us (scored 8 out of 8) although his career miss rate is a much less impressive 25.5% (scored 26 out of 35). In other words McCormack is a below average penalty taker.

Berbatov was one of the top penalty takers. He missed 0% for us (6 out of 6) although career-wise he did manage to miss 2 out of 24 (8%)

Murphy only missed 2 (one of which he then put away) for us out of 19 and they were the only ones he missed out of a career total of 28 taken (7%).

Compared to this luxury Martin has scored 15 of the 23 kicks he has taken which is a pretty weak miss rate of around 34%.
Maybe we shouldn't expect too much of him...or find another penalty taker.

excellent post

[Fulham Tup North]

Since the start of the PL (and I presume Championship stats are similar) some 1900 penalties have been awarded of which just over 1600 have been missed/saved. That's a miss rate of about 16%.

Please tell me this is a typo! Or else that is an 84% MISS RATE!!
Also, Matt Me Tissier, although never played for us, scored 47 out of 48 Pens. A strike rate of 98%!! The only one he missed was to a future FULHAM FC Keeper. A tenuous link I know (Mark Crossley)!

[nose]

the thing is, not just that we fail to convert the peanlties, but they are totally useless
when woodrow missed the howl for his blood went up and he was never heard of again...  but none of the rest have done any better and all our players seem to adopt the same second rate penalty style.
#
#it is said over and over that a  penalty has to be hit hard, very hard... even if you occasionally miss the target at least the ones on target are more likely to go in.

the best penalty taker we had IMO was Blake, i think he only missed one but his technoque was amazing. he never did the same thing varying the place he put them, but i think he decided what had to be done and did it.... murf was good, just hard and on target, lock was imense... but berba's technique defied explanation, it was amazing but heart stpping and other than him i wouldn't recommend that style ever!

it isn't the stats that are bad it is the total lack of technique and whilst i love joca, i think he and his coaching staff need to teach the players what to do i.e. hit the dam thing as hard as possible and if possible at the top corner!

[cmg]

Since the start of the PL (and I presume Championship stats are similar) some 1900 penalties have been awarded of which just over 1600 have been missed/saved. That's a miss rate of about 16%.

Please tell me this is a typo! Or else that is an 84% MISS RATE!!

Yes. Now corrected. The miss rate is as stated.

[Beamer]

Interesting to hear Murphy on MoD2 say that he was advised that if you got a penalty late in a game you should always hit it down the middle (a la Sanchez) as keepers will always dive one way or the other trying to make the great late save and it would take a really brave keeper to just stand still at that stage of the game.
As for keepers moving, I thought they were allowed to move sideways these days but not step forward until the ball has been struck. Although refs rarely seem to pull them up for it. 

[MJG]

Also lets remember that while the goal has stayed the same size the players in them are getting bigger.

[Tomo]

I think an important factor is that we have missed 3 pens against Alex Smithies.

He has faced 10 this season and saved 6.. I think it is less a reflection on our Pen takers and more so on his ability between the sticks. As a keeper I have always rated him since his days at Huddersfield. If we were to go up and QPR to stay in the Champ I would make him a priority (wouldn't have to up sticks!)

[bobbo]

Re the discussion on this re goalkeeper. He can move side to side bu cannot move forward until th kick has been taken. And yes refs miss it far too often , IMO the linesman should be brought in closer to observe this and also the gross encroachment which happen at every single penalty.the laws are very clear on this also.

[RaySmith]

Re the discussion on this re goalkeeper. He can move side to side bu cannot move forward until th kick has been taken. And yes refs miss it far too often , IMO the linesman should be brought in closer to observe this and also the gross encroachment which happen at every single penalty.the laws are very clear on this also.

I think that this is very important.

In the past the keeper  couldn't move at all until the ball was kicked - now they not only  wave their arms about to put the taker off, but move sideways in anticipation  of where the ball is going. This suits the likes of Berbatov, who feint and send the keeper the wrong way, but does lead to a lot more pen saves I think.

In the past refs enforced the 'no moving until the ball is kicked' law strictly - and this  gives the taker   a far greater chance of scoring.

[bobbo]

Agree ray I also think they shouldn't move at all till the ball kicked but we have live with these changes eh.