British football journalist Ben Lyttleton literally wrote the book on football penalties. As the author of 'Twelve Yards: The Art and Psychology of the Perfect Penalty' and 'Edge: What Business Can Learn From Football', Lyttleton is arguably the world's leading authority on the subject. His encyclopedia-like and passionate knowledge of both the game of football and the controversial penalty, make this one of the most entertaining podcasts we have done yet.

SHOW NOTES:

Caught My Eye

The obituary of anti-doping pioneer Werner Franke: https://www.nytimes.com/2022/12/04/sports/werner-franke-dead.html?smid=nytcore-ios-share&referringSource=articleShare

Main Interview

The Twitter handle of our guest Ben Lyttleton: @benlyt, or https://twitter.com/benlyt

Ben’s website, Twelve Yards: https://twelveyards.substack.com/

Article on where to aim, high or low: https://twelveyards.substack.com/p/high-or-low-where-to-aim

Fascinating article with video on Neymar’s now illegal stop-start method, and his adjustments: https://twelveyards.substack.com/p/what-neymar-did-next

The curse of the superstar - why stars miss more penalties: https://twelveyards.substack.com/p/mbappe-culture-and-the-superstar

The study on English players’ failure in shootouts that kicked off this interview: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/19058088/

Emotional contagion paper, and how player celebrations affect shootout results: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/20544488/

The most famous penalty miss ever? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g8WtxgFvvj0

The original panenka: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VxXWIZULgyw

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Barry

NPR

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