Real Madrid's Eleventh-Hour Penalty: A Once-in-a-Decade Drama
Mbappé's 100th-minute penalty winner against Rayo Vallecano was Real Madrid's first late decisive spot-kick in over a decade, challenging the narrative of favourable decisions.
Real Madrid’s dramatic late penalty conversion by Kylian Mbappé against Rayo Vallecano has reignited the age-old debate about Los Blancos and spot-kicks in the dying moments of matches.
A Rare Occurrence
Contrary to what the anti-Madrid brigade would have you believe, the 100th-minute penalty that Mbappé tucked away isn’t actually part of some regular pattern. In fact, it’s a proper rarity. The stats don’t lie - a match-winning penalty in the final moments hasn’t been awarded to Madrid in more than a decade.
Even when we’re being generous and counting anything after the 85th minute as ‘decisive’, you’ve got to go all the way back to 2015 to find the last such instance in La Liga. And that’s a long time in the football world, innit?
The Last Late Show
The previous late penalty drama starred Gareth Bale, who stepped up in the 89th minute against Córdoba after Cristiano Ronaldo had been given his marching orders. Bale’s conversion secured a 2-1 victory after Fede Cartabia’s arm blocked a shot. Before that, you’re looking at 2013 for the controversial Pepe penalty at Elche in the 94th minute.
That Elche incident caused such a barney that referee Muñiz Fernández was reportedly given a proper dressing down by then-referees’ committee president Sanchez Arminio (with Enríquez Negreira as vice president). The ref was subsequently benched for six games - something that seems unimaginable in today’s climate.
By The Numbers
The bread and butter of this story is in the stats:
- Real Madrid have been awarded just 10 ‘last-minute’ penalties in their La Liga history (from reliable records)
- That’s approximately one per decade - the same rate as Valencia and Athletic Club
- Atlético Madrid have had 9 such penalties (before last weekend they were level with Real)
- Barcelona top the charts with 11 late penalties
Barça’s Recent Fortune
Speaking of Barcelona, they’ve had a fair few recently:
- Raphinha against Celta last season (98th minute, 4-3 win)
- Lewandowski against Celta the season before (97th minute, 2-1 win)
- Gundogan against Las Palmas this season (93rd minute, 2-1 win)
So next time someone’s giving it the large about Madrid always getting the decisions in their favour, you might want to show them these numbers. Not exactly the penalty kings after all, are they? More like once in a blue moon.