- Author, Emma Smith
- Role, BBC sports journalist
For years, England fans, players and pundits have dreaded the mere mention of penalties.
England have now been involved in 10 penalty shoot-outs at European Championships and World Cups. Their record? Three wins and seven defeats.
But things seem to have changed. England no longer have any reason to be afraid of penalties. And given their perfect penalty shootout win over Switzerland, they have none.
Under Gareth Southgate, the Three Lions have won three of their last four penalty shootouts, including beating Switzerland 5-3 in the Euro 2024 quarter-final on Saturday.
All five penalties were taken with precision, while goalkeeper Jordan Pickford made a crucial save from Manuel Akanji.
The win follows penalty shootout victories under Southgate at the 2018 World Cup against Colombia, and again against Switzerland in the 2019 Nations League third-place play-off.
The defeat to Italy in the Euro 2020 final is a big stain on England’s record. But it seems this team has not been shaken.
Former England defender Matt Upson told BBC Radio 5 Live: “We’ve got players who have arrogance and confidence. That will help England because sometimes those key moments and big games can come down to that kind of bottle.”
“Pressure is for tires”
Image source, Getty Images
As Alan Shearer said as England celebrated their penalty shoot-out victory on Saturday: “The pressure is for the tyres.”
None of England’s penalty takers – Cole Palmer, Jude Bellingham, Bukayo Saka, Ivan Toney and Trent Alexander-Arnold – appeared to be feeling any pressure when they took their penalties in Düsseldorf.
England scored all five of their penalties against Switzerland, making it only the second time they have scored 100% of their attempts in a penalty shootout, as they did in Euro 96 against Spain.
Palmer lived up to the Cold Palmer nickname he cultivated at Chelsea by sending Swiss goalkeeper Yann Sommer in the wrong direction.
Bellingham brought all his leading man’s energy to the penalty shootout, rolling the ball into the right corner and celebrating in his trademark wide-armed manner.
Toney, sent on as a replacement for England captain Harry Kane during extra time, was undeterred and scored into the bottom left corner without even looking at the ball.
And to cap it all, Alexander-Arnold – sidelined after the second Euro game following a failed experiment in central midfield – blasted the ball into the top corner to spark chaos and ecstasy.
They were all excellent, but Toney’s really caught the eye when he looked straight at the goalkeeper and sent the ball into the net.
“It’s my routine. It’s what I do. Some people think it’s crazy but it works,” said the Brentford striker, who has scored 30 penalties in his career.
Upson praised Toney’s approach: “He approaches the issue of penalty by saying that psychology is more important than technique.
“He has his eyes fixed on the goalie and can therefore fine-tune and adjust his shot, which is why you see him hitting the empty side of the net so often.”
“Akanji: Left Dive”
Image source, Getty Images
There were two other heroes on the pitch during England’s penalty shootout: Pickford and his water bottle.
The England keeper had all the names of the Swiss players and the direction they should go when facing their penalties, including ‘dive left’ next to Akanji’s name.
He did just that and stopped Akanji’s shot.
Pickford has saved four of the 14 penalties he has faced in shootouts at the World Cups and Euros, twice as many as all other England goalkeepers combined saved between 1990 and 2012.
While his saves against Andrea Belotti and Jorginho could not prevent Italy from qualifying for Euro 2020, his saves against Carlos Bacca in 2018 and Akanji in 2024 were essential in helping England qualify.
“I believe in my mentality and I believe I will at least save one,” Pickford said after the match, while revealing he had been threatened with a booking by referee Daniele Orsato if he did not stay on his line and stop discouraging the Swiss goal-takers with his antics.
Those hoping to copy Pickford’s penalty shootout preparation were disappointed, however, as a question to probe the matter further in the post-match press conference was snuffed out by the England press officer, who said: “We don’t want to give away secrets.”
Why were England so good on penalties against Switzerland?
Such is the growth in confidence of the current generation that there was no fear of replacing regular penalty taker Kane in extra time, something that would have been unthinkable just a short time ago at Qatar 2022.
It is the second successive game in which Kane has been replaced in extra time – he and Bellingham were both withdrawn against Slovakia in the round of 16.
But in both games England have looked confident they have enough quality players on the pitch.
Kane told 5 Live: “I was strangely calm on the bench. I see the way the lads prepare and the way they take them. We’ve got a lot more players taking them for their clubs, and I know Pickers will save one of them.”
Toney, Palmer and Saka all lead the penalty shootout for their clubs, as does Eberechi Eze, who was not used against Switzerland.
The English attitude towards penalties has also changed. They are no longer seen as a lottery, but as something that requires extensive preparation and a lot of skill.
Last month, Gary Neville told his Overlap podcast that they had “tried everything” during his England career when it came to penalties.
Image source, Getty Images
“We won a penalty shootout in my day. I admit now we thought penalties were 50/50,” Neville said. “It’s not. You have to have really good technical players on the pitch.
“Someone told me the other week what Gareth does. He takes three players to a very quiet area of the training ground. They each take three penalties in a very methodical way. It’s quite short but concentrated and focused. Basically, you tell them to pick a spot where they’re going to take the penalty and they go there.”
Neville detailed some of the previous attempts. “We had penalty shootouts before the tournament which meant the five best penalty takers won the competition. That was Sven in 2006 in Germany. That’s how (Jamie) Carragher ended up on the pitch, coming on for two or three minutes, because he won the penalty shootout.”
Rather than using an informal competition as a basis for qualifying for a penalty shootout in the quarter-finals of a major tournament, Southgate’s England are taking a more regimented approach.
Chris Markham spent four years at the Football Association (FA) as head of game analysis and worked closely with England managers to make penalty preparations more professional.
Markham told the Daily Mirror: “I think I found quotes from every one of the last five England managers before Gareth Southgate, not including Sam Allardyce, who either said the penalty shootout was a lottery, penalties were all about luck, or you couldn’t do that kind of pressure.
“Luckily for us, Gareth and his team were extremely open-minded and respectful of quality work. But they don’t suffer fools, so we knew the standard had to be really high. Talking about run-up steps, angles, rhythm, you know everything from breathing techniques to optimal aiming zones, goalkeepers and goggles.”
Bellingham gave five live insights into how that work was undertaken and highlighted the role of England coach Jimmy Floyd Hasselbaink, the former Chelsea striker who joined the backroom staff in March 2023.
“I was really confident in my preparation and the things I had talked about with Jimmy Floyd Hasselbaink,” he said.
“He’s improved tremendously for us and it’s the work he does behind closed doors with guys who are willing to absorb that information that puts us in those situations to be able to win.
“It’s a huge team effort. Dean Henderson, Aaron Ramsdale and Tom Heaton, who were with us during this camp, helped us enormously with our penalty practice.
“They’re not going to get the credit they deserve, but if they don’t put in the effort, we can’t practice properly. And in those moments, you don’t have the proper practice to go out and execute.
“There are so many things to consider now. You’re always trying to find the edge in every game.
All that hard work has paid off and England are now no longer afraid of paying the penalty.