Of course you consider that stuff when making the order, but that is not the controversy that they are talking about. The US TV announcers and the ESPN writers are incredulous that he wasn't used AT ALL.

I just checked Facebook and saw this comment:
Why didn't Ronaldo take #4??

As I said before, the mind-boggling part to me is why you choose Alvez to take a kick. What about a giant physical defender who is mainly used for his height around goal makes you think he would be good with a PK?

Single elimination international tournament is always going to have the best sides playing more conservative than the best sides in a club home/away tourney would. How about posting the average stats for the final 4 in CL/Euro to compare to chelsea/spain respectively?

More importantly, how about adding in goals allowed?

Portugal were better in regular time, but didn't really create anything. Spain dominated extra time, and it shouldn't have gone to penalties. Always unfair to lose at penalties at this point, but Spain really deserved it more.

Also, Alves is a bit of a free kick specialist, from what I understand, so him taking a penalty isn't too weird. Spain had Pique taking one, ffs (apparently his first ever).

I was wondering about this. I imagined he was saying a lot worse. It doesn't look to me like that's what he's saying but know nothing about Portuguese, so I'll defer to you. Thanks for pointing that out.

lol spain coach w/e his name is haha

I really don't have a problem with defenders kicking if they are accurate. The fact that Alvez is so lanky and awkward looking makes it seem like he would be less accurate on PKs, but that's probably me being ridiculous. I'm assuming the coach has observed these guys in practice and chose his best kickers. Although, you have to question if Alvez has the mental focus required for a shootout considering he couldn't even walk up in the correct order.

Alves (not Alvez) lanky? He's a ****ing beast.

Yeah, I guess he's not. Just big.

Your maths teacher loves watching Spain

This is so results oriented. Bruno Alves is actually pretty good at direct free kicks and has regularly taken them at Porto and Zenit. What makes you think he'd be more likely to miss a penalty than someone else?

Marco Materazzi was a penalty expert, so gtfo with this defenders can't take penalties crap.

In those specific cases you might be right but research has shown strikers>midfielders>defenders when in comes to penalty success, on average.

Yeah but his reasoning was nothing more than "Bruno Alves is a big defender so he must suck at penalties."

Like I said, Alves is a semi-regular free kick taker, which I think is a better indicator of penalty ability than "giant defender."

lmao