Criticisms
As a way to decide a football match, shootouts have been seen variously as a thrilling climax or as an unsatisfactory cop-out.
Paul Doyle describes shootouts as "exciting and suspense-filled" and the 2008 UEFA Champions League Final shootout as "the perfect way to end a wonderful ... final". Richard Williams compares the spectacle to "a public flogging in the market square".
The result is often seen as a lottery rather than a test of skill; managers Luiz Felipe Scolari and Roberto Donadoni described them as such after their teams had respectively won and lost shootouts. Others disagree. Mitch Phillips called it "the ultimate test of nerve and technique". Paul Doyle emphasised the psychological element.
Only a small subset of a footballer's skills is tested by a shootout. Ian Thomsen likened deciding the 1994 World Cup by shootout to deciding the Masters golf tournament via a putt-putt game. The shootout is a test of individuals which may be considered inappropriate in a team sport; Sepp Blatter has said "Football is a team sport and penalties is not a team, it is the individual".
Some teams have regarded, or been accused of regarding, a loss on penalties as an honourable result or "no defeat at all". Inferior teams are tempted to play for a scoreless draw, calculating that a shootout offers their best hope of victory. Red Star Belgrade's performance beating Olympique Marseille in the 1991 European Cup Final is often condemned for having "played for penalties" from the kick-off; a tactic coach Ljupko Petrović freely admitted to. On the other hand, the increased opportunity for giant-killing may also be seen as an advantage, increasing the romance of a competition like the FA Cup.
Alternatives
Various tie-break methods have been proposed, both before and since shootouts were introduced.
Historically, one of the first tie-breaking procedures was contained in the Sheffield Rules between 1862 and 1871, with the concept of the rouge, scorable when the ball went narrowly wide of the goal. Rule 14 stated "A goal outweighs any number of rouges. Should no goals or an equal number be obtained, the match is decided by rouges".
Current alternatives include replaying a match that has ended in a draw. This still occurs in the quarter-finals and earlier rounds of the English FA Cup. Until 1991, any number of replays were permitted, with a record of five. (Since then, a draw in the (first) replay has been resolved by a penalty-shootout.) Only once, in 1974, did the European Cup final go to a replay.
Golden goal (sudden death) and silver goal (where the extra time was split into two 15-minute periods; if one team led after the first 15-minute period, the game ended) methods to encourage a result without resort to penalties have been tried. However, the International Football Association Board (IFAB) discontinued their use in 2004. These were not seen as a success, as they led to defensive play rather than encouraging the teams to try to score goals. The reason being that the fear of having a goal scored against them seemed more important than trying to score a goal themselves.
Other suggestions have included using elements of match play such as most shots on goal, most corner kicks awarded, fewest cautions and sendings-off, or having ongoing extra time with teams compelled to remove players at progressive intervals (similar to regular season ice hockey in North America, where players play 4-on-4 — or 3-on-3 — in the extra time). These proposals have not yet been authorised by the IFAB. However, after the 2006 World Cup, Sepp Blatter stated that he wants no more penalty shootouts in the Final of the World Cup, tentatively suggesting either a replay or "Maybe to take players away and play golden goal".
Henry Birtles' "Advantage" proposal is for the shootout to be held before extra-time, and only acting as a tiebreak if the game remains a draw after the full 120 minutes. Proponents of this idea state that it would lead to a more offensive extra-time as one of the teams would know they have to score and there would never be a match in which both teams are simply waiting for penalties. Another advantage is that players who have missed would have a chance to redeem themselves in extra-time. The obvious flaw is that the team that wins the penalty shootout would be inclined to play defensively in extra time in the knowledge that a draw would put them through. However, the advantage of the advantage is that for a team that would risk that the one goal is the difference between winning and losing. As opposed to a team which defends a single goal lead whereby a conceeded goal is the difference between winning a drawing.
Attacker Defender Goalkeeper (ADG) is an alternative developed by Timothy Farrell. ADG features a series of ten contests in which an attacker has thirty seconds to score a goal against a defender and goalkeeper. At the completion of the ten contests, the team with the most goals is the winner.
