World Cup final: How Argentina won penalty shootout
Paul Ellis/AFP/Getty Images By Don Riddell , CNN Updated 4:43 AM EST, Mon March 6, 2023 CNN — A soccer match lasts for 90 minutes, another 30 if there really needs to be a winner. But if it’s still level after that, then the game will be decided with a penalty shootout, arguably the most nerve-shredding experience in all of sports. For the fans, it’s excruciating; at the World Cup in Qatar, one Argentina supporter sobbed uncontrollably as she watched the quarterfinal shootout against the Netherlands through her fingers. By the end, she looked distraught. All the emotion had been wrung out of her, and the tears that she cried were of relief, rather than joy. For the players, such emotions are magnified tenfold. “Love hurts,” goes the anonymous quote, “but not as much as penalties.” Success or failure could be career-defining, one simple kick from 12 yards is weighed down by teammates’ hopes and the expectation of potentially millions of fans. As the author Karl Wiggins put ...
