Is Ademola Lookman a bad penalty taker? Here’s what the stats say

In football, there are rules — a set of regulations codified into the ‘Laws of Games’, and match officials are empowered to enforce them. There are also football ethics, some unspoken codes of profession universally agreed to based on human decency and fair play. These ethics include kicking the ball out of play when an opponent is down injured, taking your defeat — however heavy — with grace and spirit of sportsmanship, and the customary handshakes between managers before and after games. The codes also extend outside the pitch: never publicly criticise your teammates or, as a manager, your player. 

On Tuesday, Gian Piero Gasperini, Atalanta manager, was vilified for breaking one of those ethics when he singled out Ademola Lookman as “one of the worst penalty takers I’ve ever seen”.

Gasperini’s outburst was a reaction to Lookman’s tame penalty saved by Simon Mignolet, Club Brugge goalkeeper, in Atalanta’s 3-1 loss in the second leg of their UEFA Champions League (UCL) play-off.

Lookman was a halftime substitute in the game, returning after a month out with injury. Atalanta had lost the first leg of the encounter with the 27-year-old absent. There were also three goals down before he was introduced. The African Footballer of the Year pulled one goal back for Atalanta barely 36 seconds after coming on. He gave Atalanta a lifeline in a tie that was sinking them.

But Gasperini’s reaction skipped those glossy parts for the penalty miss. He said Lookman should have left the penalty to the team’s designated penalty takers and blamed the winger’s “euphoria” for becoming a hero for the episode. The Italian manager said Lookman plays poor penalties even in training.

The comments from the coach prompted a response from Lookman, who described the words as “deeply disrespectful”, adding that he took the penalty because the team’s designated taker delegated the kick to him.

Amidst the chatter about Gasperini’s spicy personality and Lookman jumping the penalty hierarchy, the question at the heart of the discourse begs to be intensely interrogated.

Is Lookman such a bad penalty-taker? Aside from the infamous panenka kick in 2020 for Fulham, the miss against Club Brugge was his first mistake from the spot. His penalty record for Atalanta was impeccable until Tuesday night.

Lookman has played five spot-kicks since joining Atalanta from Germany’s RB Leipzig in 2022. He scored four and missed just one.

In his first season, he scored a well-taken penalty into the top corner against Napoli. A few days later, against Andre Onana at Inter Milan, Lookman dispatched another top-corner penalty. He also sent Emil Audero of Como FC the wrong way when taking yet another penalty.

The only spot-kick with shady execution was in 2023 against Salernitana FC. The winger’s penalty was weak and central but managed to sneak underneath Guillermo Ochoa, Salernitana’s goalkeeper, through sheer luck.

Lookman is also not the only Atalanta player to miss crucial penalty kicks this season. Mateo Retegui, the team’s penalty specialist, saw his effort saved by David Raya against Arsenal in the preliminary stage of the UCL. The game eventually ended goalless, but a victory could have secured Atalanta’s place among the top eight teams and automatically qualified for the next round without a play-off.

Earlier in February, Retegui also missed a penalty against Torino in Serie A. Atalanta drew the game, and the result stunned their challenge for the league title.

Lookman has had a couple of blips from the spot in his professional career, but his conversion rate is far from dismal.

Gasperini’s outburst however screams the opposite.