The trill of the whistle pierces the night air. Jolted, thousands of spectators grasp for the same breath, short and sharp, and train their gazes on the source of the alarm. They locate a referee’s finger extended telescopically from his arm at a near right-angle from his body.
Penalty.
“I break away, straight away, and prepare for the spot kick,” explains Vedran Janjetović, mindfully ignoring the chaos that engulfs the referee and the bodies swarming the penalty area. The Western Sydney Wanderers goalkeeper has a job to do. It’s a deadline he’s been working towards all week.
“I start seeing the video clips and the pictures and graphs from the printouts. Then I’m zoning in, trying to read the player’s body language”. The video clips are from the exhaustive archive of every competitive penalty taken by his opponent, they’ve been watched and committed to memory earlier in the week. The printouts are the data visualisations from reams of inputs that convert a lifetime of penalty-taking into graphical shortcuts. “It’s a dot chart that describes how a player likes to take penalties, what they’re most comfortable with. Do they go across, do they stay on the same side, do they wait for the goalkeeper to make the first move before they shoot?”
The research began days ago “but we get very technical with it around game day and towards kick-off,” Janjetović says. “Literally before we go out, I look at all the papers again and we’ll look at some of the penalties again.
“Starting from that point, you can play the percentages. For example, if their graph indicates they shoot down the middle of the goal, that usually indicates they wait for the goalkeeper to move first. There’s enough data out there for it to be more than just a lottery these days”.
VAR consulted and remonstrations subdued, the box is deserted but for three protagonists: the one with the whistle, the one with the ball, and the one with the gloves. “I’m standing there looking at how he’s placed the ball, the general demeanour of the player on the ball - is he tired or is he fresh? Is he confident? Has he missed a penalty in recent weeks? If he has, he’s more likely to go where he’s comfortable, if he’s confident he might try something creative.
“You have to try and put him off as much as you can. I think this year more than any other, keepers have been more mobile on the line. There’s been more distractions and stuff and it’s paid off. It puts doubt into the taker’s head and you only need one to two percent of doubt and they’ll change their mind or mishit it.”
The trio continue their routine; the referee conducting the tempo, the penalty taker exuding composure (sometimes real, often fake), and the goalkeeper searching for tells like a Vegas hustler. “I zone in on the ball, then watch him take his steps back and try to look for signs. Is it a straight run up or a curved run up? How does that match up with the videos? Again, we go back to the percentages. If it’s a straight run up, it’s hard for him to go to the keeper’s top left.”
The trill of the whistle again, expected this time. “It seems like an eternity from when he puts the ball down to when he steps back to when the ref blows the whistle, but then, as soon as the ref blows the whistle, it’s a split second before you have to make up your mind.
“I make a decision as he’s running in. His last couple of steps are crucial. You focus on the planted foot. Is it straight, which means he’s likely to go instep, or is it a bit further away to allow him to come across you? Where’s the knee facing? It all comes very quick, but those last final moments are crucial.
“I wouldn’t say I’m expecting to save it but I’m confident all the work behind the scenes pays off. When I’ve done the work, the numbers game, the percentages, I’m more confident I have a better chance of saving it, but I never think I’ve got it saved.
“All the pressure is on the kick taker. That’s where it depends if it’s a tight game or if it’s late in the game; pressure, tiredness and all that plays into the keeper’s hands. If I’ve done the work, then I have more confidence.”
Janjetović has every right to feel confident having saved spot kicks in rounds 17 and 19, the latter setting a new mark for penalty saves across the competition in a single season. That record was extended by Ben Kennedy’s extraordinary showing on Saturday night, one that illustrated much of Janjetović’s insight.
“It’s fun because in that moment all eyes are on you and the kick taker. You can be the hero, you can win it for your team, you can put your team on the front foot. It’s part of the game and exciting for that couple of minutes. It’s a bit of a rush, a bit of adrenaline,” Janjetović says.
Before concluding: “It’s obviously better if you can avoid it though”.
