A penalty in any game is a pressure situation. A penalty in a cup final, on live television with millions watching must be the ultimate weight on any players shoulders and the aim is to get the ball in the back of the net. I’ve seen thousands of penalties in my thirty years not only watching Celtic, but football in general, and think I have seen all types of finishes.
From pile drivers, rolling the ball, passes into the bottom corners, smashes into the roof of the net and tucked into the postage stamp, any penalty that hits the back of the net is a successful. I’ll say it again. The job of the penalty taker is to hit the back of the net. Odsonne Edouard’s penalty on Sunday was a thing of beauty. A little dink down the middle to fool Hearts ‘keeper Craig Gordon was coolness personified. Class finish from a class striker confident in his own ability.
The fact that Gordon took the huff at it and reacted by throwing the ball like a petulant child made it all the more satisfying for me. However, talk of the penalty being “disrespectful” and “selfish” by pundit Neil McCann is itself disrespectful and selfish and Neil Lennon hit back at it’s comments. The Celtic boss said, “What, you want me to caution Odsonne for scoring a penalty in a cup final? Come on.
“The Panenka has been around since 1976. I have seen great players doing it, I have seen [Andrea] Pirlo doing it against England.
“I don’t remember any of those individuals getting actually criticised or being called disrespectful. It’s just complete and utter nonsense.
“Listen, I have seen players blast it over the bar, I have seen players hit the post, I have seen players scuff it, I have seen players miss penalties. I have seen Odsonne miss a penalty this year already. I have seen goalies making good saves.
“That’s his way at that moment of assessing the situation and executing it, so he has my full blessing to do whatever he wants as long as it hits the net.
“You cannot ask anyone to warn a player after he has scored a really beautiful goal in a really important game in a cup final: Don’t do that again Odsonne, because some people think it’s disrespectful.”