Distracting the Kicker

This year’s World Cup final was not decided by a penalty shootout. But in 2006, it did come down to this dramatic and controversial method to determine the winner of soccer’s biggest tournament. In a penalty shootout, the goalie squares off against the kicker in a mano-a-mano battle of will and timing, luck and skill. It’s all the excitement and heartbreak of soccer condensed into a few anxious seconds.

But other than trying to guess the direction of the ball, is there anything the goalie can do to give his team an advantage? Why yes, according to two British researchers: Move his arms.

The researchers had experienced soccer players (though not professionals) attempt penalty kicks. Sometimes, the goalie was standing still; other times, he was waving his arms. They tracked the kicker’s eye movements and the number of goals. It turns out, arm-waving was enough to distract the kicker, reduce accuracy, and increase the likelihood of a save.

From the paper:

From a penalty taker’s perspective, it seems that unwarranted attention to goalkeeper is suboptimal for accurate shooting and more importantly, increases the likelihood of performance failure…. from a goalkeeper’s perspective, attempting to distract penalty takers (especially during the aiming phase) may increase the likelihood of saving a subsequent shot by influencing aiming.

So: good for the goalie, bad for the kicker.

This reminds me of an article in Slate by Dan Engber from a few years back about the best way for a crowd to distract free-throw shooters during basketball games (short version: wave your wiggle sticks in the same direction).  

I’d bet that somewhere a team of intrepid scientists is studying the vuvuzela, that weapon of mass distraction that blew its way to prominence at this year’s World Cup. I hope they find the cure.

(For once, you can actually read the study online—though it may not be the latest version. It was published in the Journal of Sports Sciences. The authors are Greg Wood and Mark R. Wilson.)