The "Lottery" of Penalties

Possibly the biggest mistake Spurs made regarding their narrow defeat in the Carling Cup final on Sunday, occurred in the days and weeks leading up to the final. "We thought there is no point in practising penalties" revealed striker Darren Bent. I wonder if their viewpoint was beginning to change after extra time as the exhausted players linked arms on the halfway line, a grim air of inevitability engulfing the men in white.

Admittedly the finer details of the previous 120 minutes of football merited the vast majority of Redknapp's preparation time, but the fact that his team had stuck to his solid gameplan so admirably, merely makes the assumption that penalties were not worthy of even an afterthought, all the more baffling.

Redknapp's description of penalties being a "lottery" is not entirely accurate. "Lottery" implies luck, that the Spurs players had no control over their own actions around the Wembley penalty spot, that every ounce of Jamie O'Hara's football talent and experience was extracted from his body as he began the fateful walk from the halfway line.

Sure, luck plays a part, but so does skill and mental strength. To claim that a penalty competition will be decided solely by luck is to do a disservice to those whose ability to thrive from the spot affords them 'expert' status. Alan Shearer did not have such an impressive record from the penalty spot because he was a very lucky man, more that he could place a ball and hold his nerve like few others. His unerring penalty accuracy is matched only by his uncanny ability to pick a shirt straight from the Matalan bargain bin for his appearances on the Match of the Day sofa.

Manchester United practised them, Spurs didn't. Of course this is not the reason Spurs failed to retain the trophy for the first time since Nottingham Forrest in 1990, but it has to be considered a factor.

It is impossible to simulate the pressure of a shootout in any training ground situation, but that stage is sufficient for honing the skills of psyching out the 'keeper, choosing a spot and ensuring the ball ends up there. If nothing else, Spurs should have entertained the possibility of a shootout occurring by identifying a number of possible takers; and those takers should have decided where their penalties would go - at least by the night before the match - eradicating any of the doubts that can flood the mind in the tsunami of nerves which plague such situations.

Ben Foster's use of the ipod represents the other end of the preparation spectrum. Verging on the obsessive, this attention to detail will understandably not appeal to all, but at the very least it shows that United had rehearsed for the situation as best they could. Pressure will always allow for lines to be fluffed, but as the dust of fate was sprinkled over proceedings, the Reds' superior planning told.