Valencia CF once again missed a penalty in LaLiga, but this time it didn’t cost them, as they secured a vital 2-0 win against Athletic Club, moving to 42 points and taking a giant step toward survival. However, spot-kicks have become a recurring nightmare for Carlos Corberán’s side this season.
The team has missed four out of nine penalties, converting just 44% of their attempts. That makes Valencia the club with the most missed penalties in LaLiga this campaign.
The pattern repeated in Bilbao. Hugo Duro struck the crossbar from the spot when the match was still goalless. Before him, Arnaut Danjuma and Pepelu had each failed from 12 yards—Pepelu on two occasions. The Dutch winger missed against Real Oviedo at Mestalla, a moment that proved a turning point in his season. Pepelu missed against Betis and Celta Vigo, a double failure that saw him dropped from the official penalty-taker list.
“I feel partly in debt because of that miss in such an important moment. See you on Thursday,” a bittersweet Hugo Duro said after the match. Captain José Luis Gayà came to his teammate’s defense: “We’ve missed four penalties. Where would we be if we had scored them? But Hugo, with the work he does every day, has our full support. Only those who take penalties miss them. What we ask is that a player gives everything for this badge, and Hugo does that.”
So where would Valencia be if they had scored all their penalties?
Danjuma’s first miss on September 30 came with the team leading 2-0 against Oviedo in the 76th minute. What looked like a decisive advantage slipped away, and the Asturian side came back to win 2-1. Numerically, that error cost at least one point, but in reality, a 2-0 lead with 15 minutes to play practically guarantees three points.
Pepelu’s miss on January 3 in Vigo came when the score was still 0-0 in the 7th minute. The match ended 4-1, so no points were directly lost, but scoring early would have completely changed the game’s dynamics. His second miss came on February 1 against Real Betis at La Cartuja. That match finished 2-1, meaning at least a point was thrown away. Curiously, in both those games, Borja Iglesias and Chimy Ávila scored from the spot for the opposition.
Numerically, Valencia have dropped two points directly from the missed penalties against Oviedo (1-2) and Betis (2-1). But the real impact could be far greater. The early miss against Celta (when it was 0-0) and the potential 2-0 lead against Oviedo mean the club have cost themselves somewhere between 2 and 9 points.
Two extra points would put them just one point off European qualification right now. Nine points would lift them to sixth place with 51 points.
To find a worse run from the spot, you have to go back 23 years to the 2002/03 season, when Baraja (2), Aimar, and Fabio Aurelio all missed. Similar four-miss seasons occurred in 2000/01 (Diego Alonso, Juan Sánchez, Kily González, Mendieta) and 1990/91 (Penev (2), Fernando, Arroyo).
