Meritocracy isn’t a realistic aspiration
How are penalty takers selected? Conversion rate can’t be the whole story. Messi and Cristiano, who miss often enough, will always be their teams’ first-choice shooters.
We Ecuadorians are no wiser. We keep sending Enner to the spot. Sheer sentimentality, I suspect. It’s been years since he dispatched cleanly.
Mbappé and Salah missed penalty kicks this afternoon for Madrid and Liverpool. The commentators pretended to be surprised. Why? I’ve seen other horrendous misses by both players; everyone has.
Liverpool’s best taker by far, Mac Allister, was playing brilliantly and had already scored. He wasn’t considered for the penalty.
Salah is a good shooter, but Mac Allister is near-automatic.
I’d’ve assigned Madrid’s kick to Lucas Vázquez, another inspired player (he’d won the foul). He routinely delivers in the clutch. The weedy fellow has won five Champions Leagues, for goodness’s sake.
It’s his utter professionalism – in addition, perhaps, to his seniority and nationality – that earns Vázquez the captaincy when he comes off the bench. (Carvajal is injured.)
Anyway, I wouldn’t let Mbappé, that bundle of nerves, near the spot – not with the game on the line.
Ancelotti is no fool. His specialty is “team chemistry.” Stock me with talent, no matter how egotistical, he says, and I’ll combine the elements so they don’t clash. But his wizardry has limits. Madrid’s vaunted strikers can’t all function at once – not yet, anyway. Mbappé, the newcomer, is dead weight. His confidence has plummeted.
I believe that it was for this reason – or, perhaps, to prevent a tantrum or sulk – that Ancelotti allowed Mbappé to take the penalty. Not to maximize the likelihood of immediate success, but to promote the squad’s long-term success.
Even so, what I saw today, and have seen in many other games, shows that pro sport, so often celebrated for meritocratic purity, is in fact far from pure. If cutthroat Madrid and stats-savvy Liverpool defer to their Big Cheeses in big games, what are the prospects for meritocracy in a nation as a whole?
We Ecuadorians are no wiser. We keep sending Enner to the spot. Sheer sentimentality, I suspect. It’s been years since he dispatched cleanly.
Mbappé and Salah missed penalty kicks this afternoon for Madrid and Liverpool. The commentators pretended to be surprised. Why? I’ve seen other horrendous misses by both players; everyone has.
Liverpool’s best taker by far, Mac Allister, was playing brilliantly and had already scored. He wasn’t considered for the penalty.
Salah is a good shooter, but Mac Allister is near-automatic.
I’d’ve assigned Madrid’s kick to Lucas Vázquez, another inspired player (he’d won the foul). He routinely delivers in the clutch. The weedy fellow has won five Champions Leagues, for goodness’s sake.
It’s his utter professionalism – in addition, perhaps, to his seniority and nationality – that earns Vázquez the captaincy when he comes off the bench. (Carvajal is injured.)
Anyway, I wouldn’t let Mbappé, that bundle of nerves, near the spot – not with the game on the line.
Ancelotti is no fool. His specialty is “team chemistry.” Stock me with talent, no matter how egotistical, he says, and I’ll combine the elements so they don’t clash. But his wizardry has limits. Madrid’s vaunted strikers can’t all function at once – not yet, anyway. Mbappé, the newcomer, is dead weight. His confidence has plummeted.
I believe that it was for this reason – or, perhaps, to prevent a tantrum or sulk – that Ancelotti allowed Mbappé to take the penalty. Not to maximize the likelihood of immediate success, but to promote the squad’s long-term success.
Even so, what I saw today, and have seen in many other games, shows that pro sport, so often celebrated for meritocratic purity, is in fact far from pure. If cutthroat Madrid and stats-savvy Liverpool defer to their Big Cheeses in big games, what are the prospects for meritocracy in a nation as a whole?
