Emotional Gary Lineker compares Saka’s penalty decision to Stuart Pearce’s

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·8. Juli 2024

Emotional Gary Lineker compares Saka’s penalty decision to Stuart Pearce’s

When England’s game against Switzerland went to penalties, one player we did expect to take penalties was Bukayo Saka.

The Arsenal man is the penalty taker for his club, but his most recent memory of a shootout in an England shirt is not a good one.

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Most fans had their hearts in their mouth when Saka stepped up to take one of their spot kicks, and this time, he scored.

At Euro 2020, he missed, and it was the nail in the coffin for England in the final against Italy.

After that shootout in 2021, the attacker and some of his teammates faced a savage backlash from some fans. He could easily have decided not to take a penalty against Switzerland, and we all would have understood, but he did and reminded Gary Lineker of Stuart Pearce.

The pundit said, as quoted by Express Sports:

“Yeah, I’m a softy – I never used to be, I was really cold as a player.

“It reminded me so much of the Stuart Pearce moment. Stuart Pearce missed in 1990 when I played. He’s such a diamond of a bloke and a wonderful footballer. And then we played against Spain, penalty shootout in Euro 1996 and he stepped forward again.

“I was in the crowd and I was thinking ‘please, please score, don’t miss’. And everybody in the crowd was the same. There was a silence that was palpable. And when he knocked that in – I cried on that occasion, I was sitting in the crowd, crying tears of joy.”

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Saka was brave to step up to take that kick, considering what could have happened if he had missed again and England had lost the shootout.

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