Gaze Strategies in the Soccer Penalty Kicks: What Do We Really Know?

This chapter reviews the literature regarding the gaze strategies of goalkeepers and penalty takers in the soccer penalty kick situation. There is a considerable body of experimental work investigating gaze strategies in both tasks and how they contribute to effective performance. Despite the growing body of knowledge, insufficient attention has been paid to the external validity of these experimental studies. Much of this work has been laboratory-based rather than on the pitch, creating critically different spatial and temporal constraints on the goalkeepers and penalty takers’ tasks. Obviously, psychological constraints in experimental studies also fundamentally diverge from competitive penalty situations. The authors conclude the chapter by emphasizing the importance of representative design and outlining an approach that aims to assess and increase the external validity of this body of work through (automatic) analyses of video footage of penalty kick situations taken in professional competitions.