Is There an Advantage to Going Second in the Penalty Shootout?

All four penalty shootouts at the 2026 World Cup have been won by the team going second. Does it point to a broader advantage — or is it just a coincidence?

After watching 120-plus minutes of football, observing a coin toss might not feel like the most exciting dessert. Fans in the stadium care, though. Win the coin toss for a penalty shootout and you get to choose which end they are taken at — to much rejoicing from those behind the chosen goal. Another coin toss allows the winner to choose whether to go first or second.

But does that decision actually matter?

The Traditional Wisdom — and the Recent Trend

For years, the consensus was that going first in a shootout is an advantage. Being able to take the lead and put scoreboard pressure on opponents surely carries a mental benefit — and means the opposition are the ones likely to face the dreaded must-score penalty.

However, when Rubén Vargas tucked away the winning spot-kick for Switzerland against Colombia in the World Cup 2026 last 16 on Tuesday, it continued a rather curious trend.

All four penalty shootouts at World Cup 2026 have been won by the team who went second.

That is not much of a sample. But stretched further, it is now a remarkable 13 of the last 15 shootouts at men’s World Cups that have been won by the team going second — a rate of 86.7%.

Historical World Cup Data: No Clear Pattern

Prior to World Cup 2026, 18 of the 35 penalty shootouts in the men’s competition had been won by the team going second — a rate of 51.4%, suggesting essentially no advantage whatsoever.

With the most recent four added, that figure has risen to 22 of 39 (56.4%) — so it is only really the recent shootouts that suggest going second carries any benefit.

Interestingly, prior to the last 15 shootouts, only nine of the first 24 World Cup shootouts were won by the team going second — just 37.5%. That may be where the original belief that going first was advantageous came from. But even that sample is not large enough to draw firm conclusions from.

What Do Other Competitions Tell Us?

The World Cup data, in isolation, is insufficient. A broader look across football’s major competitions is needed.

UEFA European Championships

The first penalty shootout at the European Championships was in 1976 — the famous match between Czechia and Germany, where Antonín Panenka dinked in the winning spot-kick.

Across 25 shootouts at the Euros, 12 have been won by the team going second — 48%. Essentially no difference.

UEFA Champions League / European Cup

In the history of the UEFA Champions League and European Cup, there have been 42 penalty shootouts (excluding qualifiers). Here, unusually, going first appears to carry an advantage.

Only 16 of the 42 shootouts have been won by the team going second — 38.1% — suggesting a possible edge to going first in the Champions League. The most recent example saw Paris Saint-Germain beat Arsenal after the defending champions went first in Budapest.

FA Cup (Since 2013-14)

In the FA Cup since 2013-14, 43 of 75 shootouts have been won by the team going second — 57.3%. Last season alone, that figure jumped to 12 of 17 (70.6%) — mirroring the recent World Cup trend.

English League Cup (The Competition With the Most Data)

With extra time scrapped from the League Cup in 2018-19, games level after 90 minutes go straight to penalties — creating more shootout data than any other competition.

Across 207 League Cup penalty shootouts — the largest available dataset — 104 were won by the team going second: exactly 50.2%. The competition with the most evidence to draw on produces the closest result to a perfect 50-50 split of all.

Note: Four shootouts from the 2017-18 season used the ABBA format — where the team going second also went third, and so on — and have been excluded from this analysis. That format was itself trialled due to a belief that going first was too much of an advantage.

What the Data Actually Shows

The picture is inconsistent across competitions. The Champions League suggests going first may help. The League Cup — with the most data by far — suggests it makes virtually no difference. The recent World Cup trend is striking but built on a small sample.

The First-Penalty Miss Factor

While there is something to be said for striking first — going 1-0 up and immediately pressuring the opposition — it can also backfire. In the last 15 World Cup penalty shootouts, seven have seen the opening penalty missed, giving an immediate boost to the team going second. On each occasion, the team going second won.

Of the 12 instances of a team taking the first penalty in a World Cup shootout and missing, only two have recovered to win — Sweden against Romania in 1994 and Ukraine against Switzerland in 2006.

Confirmation Bias and the Captains Who Still Go First

There could be a degree of confirmation bias at play — teams aware that going second seems advantageous may feel calmer in a nervy situation simply by believing it, making it more likely they perform well regardless of whether the advantage is real.

What is notable, however, is that at World Cup 2026, only one of the four shootouts saw the team who won the toss choose to go second — Egypt against Australia. Apart from Mohamed Salah’s side, no other team appeared to have noticed the pattern and acted on it. Three of four captains still chose to go first — and none of those three ended up on the winning side.

Colombia’s Davinson Sánchez was so unsure after winning the toss that he called over goalkeeper Camilo Vargas to help decide. Between them, they chose to go first. The former Tottenham defender was clearly either unaware of the recent data or simply unbothered by it.

He probably wasn’t wrong — despite the outcome.

Ultimately, the data broadly points to going first or second being close enough to 50-50 across a large enough sample that the quality of your penalty takers and goalkeeper are almost certainly far more important than the order in which you take them.

The recent World Cup trend — 13 of the last 15 won by the team going second — is striking and genuinely unusual. But the League Cup, with 207 shootouts of evidence, brings us back to a near-perfect split.

It will be interesting to see whether the trend at World Cup 2026 continues, and how uncertain captains look when the referee flips the coin.

First or second — the most important thing is to score as many penalties as possible and hope it is enough.

Read More: Does Argentina Have a Lionel Messi Penalty Problem?

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