Bukayo Saka’s penalty redemption shows measure of the man (2024)

Only Bukayo Saka will know the true price of missing when, for the second time already in his young career, he stood with the ball on the penalty spot and all of England awaiting the outcome.

When Saka stepped up at around 8.35pm local time in Dusseldorf, to take England’s third penalty in the shoot-out against Switzerland, the moment felt extreme indeed. Saka had rescued England once already this evening with an equaliser with 10 of the regulation minutes left and the team heading out the European Championship. Little more than an hour later he was required to seize the moment again.

When Saka headed towards the Swiss goalkeeper Yann Sommer, England were 2-1 up after four penalties, and the shoot-out was in the balance. This was a 22-year-old who has been here before and seen how ugly it can be when it goes wrong. These games, as Gareth Southgate would say later, are “not national football matches, these are national events with huge pressure”.

For Saka, the subject of unconscionable racial abuse when he missed his penalty against Italy in the Euro 2020 final shoot-out three years earlier, these national events might seem daunting and unpredictable. Yet here he was, with a better idea than anyone as to what missing might entail, subjecting Sommer to the necessary deception of the great penalty taker.

With one swipe of that left foot, England were 3-1 up and two penalties away from the semi-final. Saka’s penalty was, frankly, unsavable. That they were in a penalty shoot-out at all was down to Saka.

In a team – a squad – that has so many attacking talents, when England really needed a goal it was Saka. As Euro 2024 prepared to spit England back out again, a goal behind to a messy defensive mistake and a bundle at the back post, it was Saka who stepped up. When it went finally to penalties, he was the only one of the England five who had ever taken a penalty in an international shoot-out.

He was also the only one left in the England squad from among the three players – Jadon Sancho and Marcus Rashford too – who missed their penalties three years ago against Italy. Penalties are great sporting drama. But for Saka they come with a whole other dimension much more sinister. There was no obligation for him to answer 2021’s racial abuse. But if you were looking for the measure of the man’s character then here it was again.

It had been his goal that had delivered England. When he cut in on his left foot left and swept England’s equaliser in off the post from the right channel, he did so with the assurance of one who has scored big goals and lived big moments before for his country. It is Saka who has built the most impressive Euro 2024 of any of his team-mates, moved around the team to accommodate the shifting arrangements of personnel and system.

He did that again for England this time through more than 120 gruelling minutes, across right and left for the second time in two consecutive knockout games. When it mattered most – when England were going out of the tournament – he came through.

His goal came in the frantic response to Switzerland’s breakthrough on 75 minutes. Against Slovakia in the previous round he had been moved from the right side of an attacking three to the left wing-back, in what soon became a five-man defence, when England defended their lead. It would be the same again this time, long after he scored his equaliser and the game opened up in extra-time.

Very late in this quarter-final he would be moved once more from right wing-back to left wing-back and required to defend just as intensively as he had attacked. His ability to adapt has meant, as with many good players for England over the years, Saka can feel like the spare chair.

Yet in the new 3-4-2-1 system, with Southgate’s players positioned higher up the pitch in what was a more promising first half, Saka thrived. He was at last getting the ball closer to goal in proximity to defenders. Those moments come easy to Saka, who is a master of the tight spaces and the delicate path through the brief window of opportunity as a full-back commits.

He took the game to the Swiss left wing-back Michel Aebischer in the conventional sense. Four times in the first half he went past Aebischer in a demonstration of classic wing play. To Aebischer’s credit he kept going. Although it had reached the point soon after where the Swiss defence were obliged to send someone else to help out.

Switzerland had to commit men to the Saka threat. As the game went on into extra-time that was Steven Zuber, the second-half substitute, and it came to the point that Saka had unbalanced Switzerland. They would sooner have invited him to step inside on his stronger foot than attack the byline and it was from there that the goal came.

Then, deep into extra-time, the 117th minute and with the score level, the roles were reversed with Aebischer. This time it was the latter who was the spare man for Switzerland on the right as England found themselves caught out of shape. Saka made the block and from the corner the Swiss hit Jordan Pickford’s post.

But Saka’s next great moment was to come. Tournament football brings a different pressure. These are volatile days away from the rhythm of the elite club football Saka plays the rest of the time. That he can handle it – that he keeps coming back for more, shows the quality of the player, and the man.

Related Topics

• Bukayo Saka,
• England Football Team,
• Euro 2024,
• Euro 2020,
• Switzerland Football Team