Winning Football Penalty Shootouts

Abstract

This paper analyses the best scientific approaches for any team to win a football penalty shootout. The paper also illustrates why penalty shootouts provide some of the most exciting moments in modern sport, and deduces new results about optimal shooter order and probability of each team winning at any stage. Additional results are derived about football economics, football derivatives and optimal game strategy.

A number of classic penalty shootouts are also considered including: Toluca v. Santos in the Torneo Final Bicentenario 2010; Japan v. USA in the Women’s World Cup 2011; Brazil v Chile in the World Cup 2014; China v USA in the Women’s World Cup 1999; Zambia v Ivory Coast Africa Cup of Nations 2012 and from rugby union: Leicester v Cardiff in the Heineken Cup 2009.

Keywords: Tanda de penaltis decisiva, séance de tirs au but, decisão por pênaltis, elfmeterschießen, Лучшие Серии Пенальти, calci di rigore, 足球点球大战, サッカーPK戦, soccer, football, multinomial model, double binomial, knockout barrier options, game theory, World Cup, Euro 2016, African Cup, ركلات الترجيح

JEL Classification: C72, G12, C73