# Penalty Shootouts: Ordering Takers and Choosing Keepers
A shootout compresses months of tactical work into roughly ten minutes of isolated duels from twelve yards. That compression is why shootouts feel like luck and why coaches treat them like chess. The rules are fixed, the pressure is enormous, and the margins are tiny—which means the decisions made *before* the first kick often matter more than anything that happens on the night.
This guide covers the two decisions a coaching staff controls most directly: the order in which takers step up, and the choice of goalkeeper for the shootout itself.
What the Format Actually Allows
Before the psychology, the mechanics. Under the Laws of the Game, a shootout proceeds in alternating kicks—team A, then team B, then A, and so on—with each team taking five kicks unless one side has an unassailable lead earlier. If the score is still level after five each, the shootout moves to sudden death, kick for kick, until one team converts and the other misses in the same round.
Only players on the pitch at the end of extra time (or at the end of normal time, if the competition goes straight to penalties) are eligible to take kicks. Each team must reduce to the same number of players before the shootout begins if the sides are unequal, and only the named goalkeeper may face kicks—substitutions of the keeper are permitted only under the competition's rules, typically at the end of extra time rather than mid-shootout. These constraints shape everything below: your list of five is drawn from whoever is still standing, in whatever state they are in.
Ordering Takers: The Case Against the Conventional Wisdom
The folk model says: put your best penalty taker first, your second-best second, and hide your weakest player in the fifth slot. The reasoning is intuitive—your best player guarantees a strong start, and by the time the fifth kick arrives, the match may already be decided.
There is a competing view, popularised by game-theory analysis, that the fifth kick is the one most likely to carry decisive pressure, and that a team's most reliable taker should therefore be saved for it. Both positions have defenders among elite coaches, and neither is obviously wrong. The honest answer is that the ordering debate is less about a magic formula and more about matching slots to temperaments you actually know.
What the research and coaching experience agree on is narrower and more useful:
- The first kick sets the emotional temperature. A converted first penalty settles the whole bench; a miss hands the initiative to the opponent and puts pressure on the second taker. Whoever takes kick one should be someone who is comfortable opening, not someone being tested.
- The middle kicks are where shootouts are quietly lost. Kicks two, three, and four get less attention than the opener and the closer, but a miss in the middle is what turns a comfortable lead into sudden death.
- The fifth kick is not always decisive. It only ends the shootout if the maths allows it. Teams that build their order around a hypothetical fifth-kick hero sometimes never reach it.
A practical framework
Think in roles rather than a rigid 1-to-5 ranking:
1. The opener — a player with a settled technique and a short memory. Reliability matters more than reputation here. 2. The stabilisers (kicks two to four) — your most technically consistent takers. These are the players who strike the ball cleanly under fatigue, not necessarily the ones with the biggest profiles. 3. The closer — ideally your most composed taker, whether that is the fifth kick or the first sudden-death kick. If you have a player who genuinely thrives on the decisive moment, this is where they belong.
Then there is the question nobody enjoys: who takes the kicks you hope not to need. In a full five-kick shootout, every eligible outfield player may be required, and in sudden death the order simply continues. A taker list that stops at five is incomplete. Build a list of eight to ten names, in order, and rehearse it.
Selection criteria that hold up
- Technique over stature. A clean, repeatable strike—side-foot into a chosen corner—beats a powerful hit with uncertain placement.
- Current state, not career record. Fatigue, injury, and confidence on the night all matter. A player who has run 120 minutes and is carrying a knock is a different taker from the same player at kick-off.
- Willingness. A player who does not want the ball is a liability regardless of ability. Asking players directly, in training, which slot they would choose is a legitimate selection tool.
- Goalkeepers can take kicks. Nothing in the Laws prevents it, and some keepers are among their team's most reliable strikers of a dead ball. Weigh the risk of losing your keeper's presence in goal against the value of a strong taker.
- Recent form in training is weak evidence. Practice penalties are useful for technique and routine, not for predicting nerve.
Choosing the Goalkeeper
The keeper decision is usually framed as a straight choice between your first-choice goalkeeper and a specialist. It is worth separating the components.
Shot-stopping vs. shootout preparation
A goalkeeper's league form is a poor guide to shootout performance, because shootouts are a different task: a small number of isolated kicks, with no game state to read and no defenders to organise. What matters is the keeper's ability to commit to a decision, hold their ground, and recover from a conceded kick without unravelling.
Preparation is where coaches can add real value. Studying takers' habitual sides, run-up angles, and body shape before contact gives a keeper a prior to work from. The key is discipline: a keeper who has studied the opposition but dives early out of nerves has wasted the homework. Delay, patience, and a clear plan for each taker are the skills to rehearse.
The specialist-keeper question
Some teams have used a substitute goalkeeper specifically for shootouts, bringing them on late in extra time. It can work, but it carries real costs:
- It signals doubt in the first-choice keeper, which can affect squad dynamics.
- It burns a substitution and consumes a window that might be needed elsewhere.
- The incoming keeper may be cold, having played little or no part in the match.
- Competition rules vary, and some do not permit the manoeuvre in the way teams assume.
If a staff does go down this route, the decision should be made well before the match, communicated honestly to both keepers, and rehearsed so the change is routine rather than dramatic.
Practical keeper preparation
- Rehearse the routine, not just the dives. A keeper's pre-kick ritual—positioning, communication with the referee, reset between kicks—should be identical in training and in the shootout.
- Use real takers in training. Facing teammates taking full-pressure penalties, with a consequence for the loser, is closer to the real thing than a line of cones.
- Prepare for the whole order, not just the first five. Sudden death is common, and the tenth taker on the list may be the one who decides it.
- Brief the keeper on the opponent's known takers, but keep the briefing short. Too much information invites paralysis.
The Details That Decide Shootouts
A few operational points get overlooked in the tactical discussion:
- Know the rules cold. Which players are eligible, how many kicks each team takes, how sudden death works, and whether the competition permits a keeper substitution. Confusion in the moment is avoidable.
- Manage the walk from the centre circle. The taker's approach is part of the routine; some players prefer to walk alone, others want a word from a teammate. Respect the individual pattern.
- Keep the bench calm. The players waiting are watching, and their body language reaches the taker. A staff that panics transmits panic.
- Decide the order in advance and write it down. Improvisation under pressure produces the worst orderings—usually the one where nobody wants the fifth kick.
Takeaways
Ordering takers and choosing a keeper are judgement calls, not formulas. The most defensible approach is to build a full, rehearsed list of takers in role-based slots, prioritise technique and temperament over reputation, prepare the goalkeeper for the specific task of a shootout rather than the general task of goalkeeping, and make every operational decision—including any keeper change—long before the whistle. Shootouts reward teams that have already made their choices; the ten minutes on the night are for execution, not deliberation.