MOSCOW: When David Ospina dived correctly to his left and palmed away Jordan Henderson’s shot, the man at the end of the long line of English substitutes and backroom staff, standing with arms around each others’ shoulder, stayed motionless. He was still frozen, his face betraying not a hint of emotion when Andres Uribe bounced his shot off the crossbar. Presumably, him staying still was key to whatever counterspell that England had cast to break the curse for when Jordan Pickford dived to his right and saved Carlos Bacca’s shot, he was still motionless even as others, on the pitch and on the sidelines, punched the air in celebration.
But when Eric Dier put his spotkick beyond a diving Ospina’s grasp, Gareth Southgate finally celebrated, forming a tight huddle with two of his backroom staff and burying his head deep in it. The curse had been lifted. England had finally won a penalty shootout! England’s run at penalty shootouts in major tournaments is the stuff of legend.
There is an old joke that props up at every World Cup. “Football is a simple game. Twenty-two men chase a ball around and at the end, Germany win.” They could have easily changed that last line to “At the end, England lose a penalty shootout.” Before the Colombia game, England had participated in eight penalty shootouts over 28 years in World Cups and the European Championships and had won one — in the quarterfinal of the 1996 Euros when current Spain coach Fernando Hierro and Rafael Nadal’s uncle Miguel Angel Nadal missed to hand the Three Lions victory on home turf.
Their first was in the semifinal of the 1990 World Cup when Stuart Pearce and Christopher Waddle missed their last two kicks of the shootouts and caused that famous image of a crying Paul Gascoigne. And then in the semifinals of the ‘96 Euros, right after that shootout victory over Spain, England crashed out against Germany. After both sides had scored their first five penalties, the man who masterminded the end of their jinx against Colombia, Southgate himself, missed the sixth.
Two years later, at the 1998 World Cup, Paul Ince and David Batty failed to find the net in the shootout that followed that infamous match against Argentina in which David Beckham got sent off. Beckham was however on the pitch to send his penalty into orbit as England went down to Portugal in the quarterfinal of the 2004 Euros, Darius Vassell missing the other one. Portugal again dumped England out on penalties just two years later, this time in the quarterfinal of the 2006 World Cup in Germany when Frank Lampard, Steven Gerrard and Jamie Carragher all missed their kicks.
Their most recent reverse came in the 2012 Euros when Ashley Young and Ashley Cole missed the last two kicks of a quarterfinal shootout loss to Italy. However, on Tuesday, it was as if a healing balm had been applied on all those wounds. The average age of the penalty takers was just 24 and ironically it was the oldest and the most experienced amongst them who missed. “Obviously we spoke a lot about being an inexperienced, young team, but we grew a lot out there tonight,” said captain Harry Kane, who also scored England’s only goal of the game in regulation time — another penalty.
“When we were behind in the penalty shootout we were thinking ‘please, save one Pickers!’ And he did. It was nice to get it off our back and we can move forward now.” If England’s next game against Sweden does boil down to penalties, they will go into that one as favourites. Southgate & Co have turned the script on its head. Over to Samara. Result: Colombia 1 (Mina 90+3) England 1 (Kane 57-pen) England win 4-3 on penalties. vishnu.prasad@newindianexpress.com