Exploring the secrets of kicking a penalty

By Birgit Zimmermann Jun 24, 2010, 11:30 GMT

Berlin - For any football player who has choked when it comes time to take a penalty kick, psychologist Georg Froese has some good news.

'I'm convinced that it's possible, with some training, to increase the success rate of penalty kicks,' he said. It's possible to boost success rates from 75 per cent to 80 or even 90 per cent.

'A lot of the options haven't been exhausted with training,' he said. Working on his doctoral thesis at Germany's University of Leipzig, Froese is focusing on success and failures in penalties.

Wearing a sports shirt and sports shoes in his office, he looks out over the roofs of the city. 'Penalty shots always fascinated me,' he says. 'This game within a game is really simple, but it gets complex.'

Aged 31, he knows of what he speaks. He's been playing football for 25 years, even making it to the regional levels with his home team Union Berlin.

'I noticed then that I didn't have what it takes for professional football.' Nonetheless, his success ratio with penalties was respectable. Now he's staying true to his lifelong passion, although in the realm of academia.

He studied professional literature and databanks of over 4,000 penalty kicks in German Bundesliga history. Included in that research was listening to interviews from players about what went through their heads when it came time to take a penalty.

Next he embarked on an experiment he and his team dubbed 'The 11-metre king of Leipzig.' About 60 amateur players were invited to the tournament and asked to kick the 11-metre shots while under pressure.

'We wanted to see if one kind of player succeeded and which strategies he used in pressure situations.'

Of course, stress levels at the experiment couldn't compare to those of the World Cup final, Froese says. 'But, in general, we know that the simulation of pressure is pretty effective. The mechanism, thus, remains the same.'

Stress was achieved by having players do math in their head while shooting goals or kicking while their comrades were all gathered around close. Shooters who learned coping strategies for these situations got better, Froese said.

Once his thesis is completed next year, Froese hopes it can be used as the basis for future training. 'The whole thing should end in an output model where the performance rates of successful penalty takers can be scientifically substantiated. Training programmes could start with the very young.'