Average. It’s normally the last adjective used to describe Lionel Messi, but, as far as penalty-taking goes, there is nothing special about the Argentine.His miss from 12 yards in the group stage win over Austria was the third time he has failed to score from seven World Cup penalties in regulation time. Four years ago, he had one saved by Poland’s Wojciech Szczesny, and Hannes Thor Halldorsson of Iceland kept him out in 2018.Extend that to his entire international career, and he is on 25 goals from 31 penalties taken. Including club matches, his 149 penalties have returned 116 goals — that 77 per cent success rate is a touch below average among elite players.Conceptually, this is hard to make sense of. He’s widely considered the greatest ever, as a record eight Ballon d’Or titles and four Champions League trophies reflect.Messi scores goals, he makes them, and he finds space and passes better than everyone else. It seems fanciful that any player in the future will be able to match his left foot.So why is he so average when it comes to scoring what are, statistically, the easiest chances? In NBA terms, this would be like Stephen Curry still having his three-point ability but putting up mid-level free-throw numbers.One common myth is that it is due to his being left-footed. Many consider right-footers better and more reliable penalty takers. Statistically, this is untrue; just that much fewer footballers are lefties (around one in five) and thus take fewer penalties. But there is an inherent advantage to that rarity: goalkeepers tend to find them harder to predict.Messi has taken penalties throughout his career. In 2005 at the under-20 World Cup, Argentina beat Nigeria 2-1 in the final thanks to two Messi spot-kicks. He dispatched both casually, rolling the first into the bottom-left corner and later picking the other side. The goalkeeper twice went the wrong way.Messi’s penalty goes wide (Michael Steele/Getty Images)Nine times he’s stepped up to take the first penalty in a shootout for Argentina, and scored seven of those — the misses came at the Copa America, first in 2016, when they lost the final to Chile, and in 2024, when Argentina knocked out Ecuador in the semi-finals.There are specific issues with his penalty miss against Austria, as well as broader criticisms of his approach.He lost a battle of wits with Alexander Schlager in Arlington, Texas. Messi had more than five minutes to decide his shot, as VAR intervened to give a foul by Stefan Posch on Lautaro Martinez.