No One Wants Penalties

I did plan to write in the usual structure, reduce a two hour game and penalties into a sentence, compare Argentina's manager Alejandro Sabella to a poddling from the 80s kids classic,The Dark Crystal, and talk about my new found love for Ron Vlaar (the best lobotomized footballer in the world). However I have started to bore myself and last night's match was typically dominated by one cliche statement.

NO ONE WANTS PENALTIES!

No one wants penalties. Really! I mean it looked to me that the twenty-two cowards on the pitch wanted penalties. No one wants penalties because its a lottery, so goes the cliche but when players are scared to make a mistake and become vilified by their respective countries maybe a lottery does not seem like such a bad option. No one wants penalties because its a lottery and their must be a better way to decide the game, except both managers who can blame their World Cup exit on penalties and be morally absolved. The No one wants penalties  mantra used by so many commentators over so many a World Cup is a total lie. Everyone loves a penalty shoot out! 

Your friend who has half watched a two hour game and talked incessantly throughout the match will shut up and watch a penalty shoot out. The family member who just walks into a living room after watching none of the match will instinctively know to be silent and watch the penalty shoot out. The casual viewer who would flick over to another channel if the players were actually playing football will stop and watch the penalty shoot out. People tune into a penalty shoot outs for the simple reason a penalty shoot out guarantees drama and commentators love guaranteed drama as it makes their lives easier.

All commentators want a penalty shoot out to provide meaning to the last two hours of their life. Especially if the game was a dull nil nil and you have over used the classic lines "this game's  tactical masterclass (in not scoring), it's like a game of chess out there (it never is), the game is teetering on the edge (of being interesting), the game's simmering (not boiling that would be too interesting), the game is like watching white paint dry on white walls while being painted by men dressed in pure white (I made that one up but its a more accurate description)"  Seriously commentators are massive hypocrites because penalties create an easy narrative. International penalties are like a murder in a soap opera, its a lazy conclusion but its most dramatic story arch  and  it only happens every two to four years. 

To be fair, Argentina against the Netherlands was not a bad game but that's because of the threat of penalties. In the context of the knock out stages the Netherlands play was perceived as hard working and unlucky but if this game was in the group stages, they would have been called  unimaginative and talent less. Similarly if you take Argentina's performance and place it in the group stages it  would (and they had been described) as unadventurous  and lacking ideas.Instead Argentina in the knock out stages now look like the most defensively solid team in the tournament (only conceding three goals in six games)  and no longer cursed by the pre-tournament hype of being most exciting attacking team in the world.

Clearly if you asked Brazil now if they could have played for penalties on Tuesday they would say yes. No doubt Brazil's embarrassment may have contributed to both teams caginess, knowing what damnation could await either team if they lost heavily. So how do you resolve the penalty conundrum?  When penalties become a lead or a muzzle to attacking football! I think you call the penalties bluff! Introduce the penalties into all leagues across the world and make every draw in normal time result in penalties. If the lottery is common place then less people will play it especially the team's wealthy in good players. All of sudden penalties would actually not be the easy option and become the dreaded Russian roulette it was intended to be..... To be honest I don't want that. 

Call me a conservative but I like things how they are!  I just don't like the media hypocrisy surrounding them. Its just important to remember that people want penalties, its not actually a lottery, it does actually take a lot of skill to shoot under pressure or make a save and it's not amoral to win at penalties, except if you're German. Basically we should change the mantra to 

The English do not want penalties because they never win the lottery and if they did it would be amoral, (like the Germans), so we would rather lose and be morally vindicated, as in keeping with our tradition to be proud snobs!

To hear such enlightened views I would suggest you press the red button to get CBBC's Hacker T Dog's World Cup commentary, a much improvement on the twittering of bland and bland commentators.

One day the world will be a better place and the obnoxious jingoism of ITV's Clive Tyldlsy will be replaced by a barking dog.