By Daily Sports Nigeria on January 20, 2026

Football is often described as a game of fine margins, but nowhere is that truer than from 12 yards. A penalty is supposed to be an advantage, a moment of control amid chaos. Yet history shows that it can also be the cruellest moment of all, one kick capable of haunting careers, defining legacies, and rewriting football folklore.

From World Cup finals to continental showpieces, these are the penalty misses that hurt the most, according to Planet Football.

10  Kingsley Coman – 2022 World Cup Final

France’s defeat to Argentina in the 2022 World Cup final will forever belong to Lionel Messi, but for Kingsley Coman, it will always be something else entirely.

Neither were they part of France’s 2018 triumph. Four years later, with the trophy on the line, he failed from the spot in the shootout. The margins were tiny, the pressure unbearable.

Coman, now playing his football in Saudi Arabia, may never get another opportunity at football’s biggest prize.

9: Aurélien Tchouaméni-2022 World Cup Final

Young and still central to France’s future, they should have more chances, but World Cups are never guaranteed. His penalty miss came in the 2022 FIFA World Cup final between France and Argentina in Lusail, Qatar.

During the penalty shootout, after the match finished 3–3 following extra time, Tchouaméni stepped up to take France’s second kick. Under immense pressure, he dragged his shot wide of the right post, giving Argentina an early advantage in the shootout. The moment became one of the most painful of his young career, a stark reminder of how unforgiving football’s biggest stage can be.

8. Mohamed Salah – 2022 World Cup Play-Off

Mohamed Salah is one of the most reliable penalty-takers of his generation, which made Egypt’s World Cup exit all the more painful.

In the 2021 AFCON final, Salah was pencilled in for the fifth penalty. It never came. Weeks later, fate cruelly paired Egypt with Senegal again, this time in a World Cup play-off.

Determined not to be a spectator, Salah stepped up — and missed. Blinded by green laser pointers and surrounded by chaos, Egypt fell short once more.

For a player of Salah’s stature, missing a World Cup remains one of football’s harshest injustices.

7. Jadon Sancho – Euro 2020 Final

The racist abuse that followed England’s Euro 2020 shootout defeat overshadowed the football itself, marking one of the darkest chapters in the national game.

For Jadon Sancho, it was also a career crossroads.

Unlike Marcus Rashford and Bukayo Saka, Sancho never truly recovered. A big-money move to Manchester United followed, but the electric winger who dazzled at Borussia Dortmund never reappeared consistently.

Since that miss against Italy, Sancho’s England career has stalled — a stark reminder of how one moment can alter a trajectory forever.

6. David Trezeguet – 2006 World Cup Final

Ask most fans about the 2006 World Cup final and one image dominates: Zinedine Zidane’s headbutt.

Almost forgotten is the man who actually missed France’s decisive penalty — David Trezeguet.

His effort crashed against the crossbar in Berlin, ending France’s hopes. Fortunately for Trezeguet, he already had a World Cup medal from 1998. That softened the blow, even if the miss still lingers quietly in football memory.

5. John Terry – 2008 Champions League Final

Rain, a slip, and a moment Chelsea fans will never forget.

John Terry wasn’t meant to take one of the first five penalties in Moscow. Didier Drogba’s red card changed everything.

Terry’s miss denied Chelsea their first Champions League title — a burden he openly admitted haunted him for years. Redemption finally arrived in 2012, but the image of his slip remains one of European football’s most iconic heartbreaks.

4. Stuart Pearce – 1990 World Cup Semi-Final

Stuart Pearce’s miss against West Germany in 1990 weighed on him for six long years.

So when he stepped up again at Euro ’96 and scored, the raw emotion told its own story. It wasn’t just a penalty. It was released.

“For me, failure wouldn’t have been to miss again,” Pearce later said. “Failure would have been not to try.”

Few moments better capture football’s brutal psychological toll.

3. Gareth Southgate – Euro ’96 Semi-Final

Before England developed a national penalty complex, there was Gareth Southgate.

His miss against Germany at Wembley triggered a run of shootout failures that lasted decades. England exited four consecutive major tournaments on penalties before finally breaking the curse in 2018.

Poetically, Southgate was the manager when redemption arrived.

Football, as ever, has a sense of irony.

2. Brahim Díaz – 2025 AFCON Final

Recency ensures this one already feels infamous.

On home soil. In the final decades in the making. With victory seconds away.

Brahim Díaz attempted a panenka — and failed spectacularly. The miss drained the stadium of belief, and Senegal’s extra-time triumph felt inevitable from that moment.

A lesson football never stops teaching: arrogance and bravery often look identical until the ball stops moving.

1. Roberto Baggio – 1994 World Cup Final

There was only ever one number one.

Baggio’s miss in Pasadena remains the ultimate penalty gut punch. The stage, the silence, the ball sailing into the California night.

“If I had had a knife at that moment, I would have stabbed myself,” Baggio later admitted.

No moment better captures the unbearable weight of football’s biggest responsibility, one kick, one miss, and a legacy forever defined.

Source Punch Ng

Posted January 20, 2026

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