Lionel Messi Is the Greatest Ever So Why Is He Only an Average Penalty Taker?

Average. It is normally the last adjective applied to Lionel Messi. But when it comes to penalty-taking, there is nothing particularly special about the Argentine.

His miss from 12 yards in the group-stage win over Austria was the third time he has failed to score from seven World Cup penalties in regulation time. Four years ago in Qatar, he had one saved by Poland’s Wojciech Szczęsny. In 2018 at Russia, Hannes Þór Halldórsson of Iceland kept him out.

Extend that to his entire international career and he stands at 25 goals from 31 penalties taken. Include club matches and his 149 penalties have returned 116 goals — a 77% success rate that sits a touch below average among elite players.

Conceptually, this is difficult to reconcile. Messi is widely considered the greatest footballer of all time. Eight Ballon d’Or titles. Four Champions League trophies. Goals, assists, space creation, and passing that no player in history has matched. The idea that his left foot has any flaw seems almost fanciful.

And yet.

The Data: Nothing Special From 12 Yards

For context, this is statistically comparable to an NBA player with Steph Curry’s three-point shooting but mid-level free-throw numbers — a jarring discrepancy between elite skill in one department and mediocrity in something that should, theoretically, be easier.

One common myth is that Messi’s difficulties stem from being left-footed. Many assume right-footers are more reliable penalty takers. The statistics do not support this. Far fewer footballers are left-footed — roughly one in five — and thus take fewer penalties. But there is actually an inherent advantage to that rarity: goalkeepers find left-footed takers harder to predict, because they face them less frequently.

A History of Inconsistency: From Under-20 Champion to Routine Misser

Messi’s relationship with penalties is not uniformly poor. At the 2005 Under-20 World Cup, he beat Nigeria twice from the spot in the final, dispatching both casually — the goalkeeper went the wrong way each time. He has taken the first penalty in a shootout for Argentina nine times, scoring seven of those. The misses came at Copa América — first in the 2016 final (lost to Chile) and the 2024 semi-final (against Ecuador).

In Qatar 2022, he converted six of seven penalties, including two in shootout situations in the quarter-final against the Netherlands and the final against France. There, he watched the goalkeeper, read the dive, and placed his shot to the opposite side.

“I wasn’t thinking about where to shoot against Lloris; it was about waiting until the last moment,” he said after the final. “I waited for him, he moved, but I was very calm.”

But between those peaks of clinical execution lie a recurring pattern of misses, saved attempts, and poor technique choices.

The Austria Miss: What Actually Happened

The penalty against Austria contained specific technical and psychological layers worth examining.

The foul that earned the spot-kick — a Stefan Posch challenge on Lautaro Martínez — triggered a VAR review, giving Messi more than five minutes to decide on his approach. He had touched the ball only three times in the eight minutes before the penalty and had not yet taken a shot. His rhythm was cold.

Off a short run-up, Messi decelerated with his final two steps — a deliberate technique designed to entice the goalkeeper into committing early, leaving space on one side for the shooter to exploit. Austria goalkeeper Alexander Schlager did not bite. Arms outstretched, Schlager held his position while Messi locked eyes with him during the approach. Schlager dived late but had done enough.

Messi pulled an awkward instep shot wide of the right post.

“I was angry,” Messi told reporters afterwards. “I hit it very badly.”

Geir Jordet, penalty expert at The Athletic, offered a precise technical explanation for what went wrong:

“This is another example of goalkeepers being aware of goalkeeper-dependent penalty takers. Messi is forced to make a decision without knowing where the goalkeeper is headed. Because he is watching the goalkeeper, his eyes are off the ball, and he will necessarily lose some precision.”

Jordet continued: “My guess is that when Messi, mid-kick, sees Schlager go in the same direction his shot is intended to go — and it’s too late to change it — he attempts to make sure it is placed as far over to the post as possible, and it goes wide.”

The Goalkeeper-Dependent Approach: A Double-Edged Sword

Messi’s penalty technique belongs to a specific category that Jordet describes as “goalkeeper-dependent” — where the shooter watches the goalkeeper and makes a late decision based on where they see them moving.

Other practitioners of this approach include Jorginho, Robert Lewandowski, and, more recently, Harry Kane. The method has a certain logic: by waiting for the goalkeeper to commit, the shooter theoretically sends the ball to the undefended side.

But it contains an inherent vulnerability. When the goalkeeper does not commit — when they hold their position until the last possible moment, as Schlager did — the goalkeeper-dependent taker is caught making a decision with their eyes off the ball, reducing precision at precisely the moment it matters most.

Kane, by contrast, has developed a trademark whipped, mid-height penalty that he delivers consistently to one side. The routine is trained, trusted, and independent of goalkeeper movement. Messi has no equivalent default.

“He doesn’t really have a stock penalty in technique or location,” Jordet notes. “He switches between instep and laces finishes. His inventiveness — the very thing that sets him apart in open play — may count against him from 12 yards.”

The Career Pattern: Always Misses at Least One Per Year

The data across Messi’s career reveals a striking consistency in its inconsistency.

Every year he has taken multiple penalties, he has missed at least one.

In 2012 — his legendary 91-goal year, when he scored 14 of 17 penalties — he began introducing deceleration steps into his run-up. Harder-hit efforts and higher shots became more common, particularly to the right. These were easier for goalkeepers to read and relied on beating them for speed.

Panenkas — the chipped, down-the-middle technique named after Czech legend Antonín Panenka — arrived in 2015 and earned praise from Panenka himself. They have recurred throughout his career. He hit the bar with a Panenka against Ecuador at Copa América two years ago. The same technique was made to look spectacularly foolish by Charlotte goalkeeper Kristijan Kahlina, who stood completely still as Messi chipped it straight at him last September in an MLS match.

Early in his career, he would practically pass the ball into the far corner from a short, slow run-up. Research has shown that taking penalties quickly after the referee’s whistle is linked to lower conversion rates and is considered a marker of nervousness. Messi has often been observed taking his run-up promptly — a pattern that may have undermined him at key moments.

The Contradictions: Shootouts vs Open Play vs Group Stage

What makes Messi’s penalty record so analytically interesting is that it does not follow a simple pattern.

In shootouts, he has generally been excellent — his pressure-situation conversion rate is notably better than his in-game record. In the 2022 final against France, he scored in the match and in the shootout. Against the Netherlands in the quarter-final, he scored from 12 yards in normal play and the shootout.

In Copa América group games and World Cup group stage matches, the miss rate is noticeably higher.

Against Poland in Qatar 2022 — having already had a penalty saved by Szczęsny — Messi took an essentially identical approach in the next penalty opportunity and was saved again. He had backed himself to beat the same psychological battle twice. He did not.

Against Austria in 2026, facing a goalkeeper with a notably strong penalty record — Schlager had saved two penalties in the Europa League that same season — Messi chose the high-risk, goalkeeper-watching approach rather than a committed directional strike.

The decision speaks to something fundamental about his character: the same intuitive improvisation and in-the-moment creativity that makes him exceptional in open play is not necessarily the ideal trait for a discipline that rewards routine, habit, and predetermined decision-making.

The Broader Picture: It Still Doesn’t Define Him

In the same game against Austria in which he missed the penalty, Messi scored twice — and in doing so, surpassed Miroslav Klose’s record to become the all-time leading scorer in men’s World Cup history.

The miss does not define him. It barely dents him.

A 77% penalty conversion rate across 149 career attempts is not catastrophic — but it is measurably below what elite penalty specialists achieve. The pattern of misses across his career is real, documented, and recurring.

What it reflects is not a failure of nerve or ability in any conventional sense. It reflects the fact that Messi approaches penalties the way he approaches everything — with intuition, with reading-the-moment, with an expectation that his genius will find a solution in real time.

For open-play football, that approach produced the greatest career in the sport’s history. For penalties — a discipline that rewards trained habit, committed decision-making, and independence from goalkeeper movement — it creates a vulnerability that has never been fully resolved.

Even the greatest player who ever lived has a weakness. For Messi, it is penalties.

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