Tophat World Cup Procedures for “Penalty Shootout”

The following is a summary of the procedure for kicks from the penalty mark. The procedure is specified in FIFA's booklet Laws of the Game, not as one of the 17 numbered laws, but within the supplementary section Procedures to Determine the Winner of a Match.

• The team to take the first kick is decided by a coin toss and the referee chooses the goal at which the kicks are taken. All kicks are taken at one goal to ensure that both teams' kick-takers and goalkeepers face the same pitch irregularities (if any).
  
  
• All players other than the kicker and the goalkeepers must remain in the pitch's center circle.
  
  
• Each kick is taken in the general manner of a penalty kick. Each kick is taken from the penalty mark, with the goal defended only by the opposing goalkeeper. The goalkeeper must remain between the goal-posts on her goal-line until the ball has been kicked, although she can jump in place, wave her arms, move side to side along the goal line or otherwise try to distract the shooter.
  
  
• Each kicker can kick the ball only once per attempt. If the ball is saved by the goalkeeper the kicker cannot score from the rebound (unlike a normal penalty kick). Similarly, if the ball bounces off the goal posts, the kicker cannot score from the rebound.
  
  
• Teams take turns to kick from the penalty mark in an attempt to score a goal, until each has taken five kicks. However, if one side has scored more goals than the other could possibly reach with all of their remaining kicks, the shootout ends regardless of the number of kicks remaining.
  
  
• If at the end of these five rounds of kicks the teams have scored an equal number of goals, sudden death rounds of one kick each are used until one side scores and the other does not.
  
  
• Only players who were on the pitch at the end of play are allowed to take kicks. (For Tophat World Cup, all players on the team will be allowed to kick, however the last bullet point will still apply.)  A substitution can only be made in the case of injury to a goalkeeper during the kicks, provided the team has not already used the maximum number of substitutes allowed by the competition.
  
  
• No player is allowed to take a second kick from the penalty mark until all other eligible players on his team have taken a first kick, even the goalkeeper.
  
  
• If at the beginning of kicks from the penalty mark one side has more players on the pitch than the other, then the side with more players must select an appropriate number of players who will not take part. For example, if Team A has 11 players but Team B only has 10, then Team A will choose one player who will not take part. Players deselected cannot play any part in the procedure: so a goalkeeper cannot be deselected from kicking while retained for saving. This applies whether players are absent through injury or being sent off. The rule was introduced by the IFAB in February 2000 because previously an eleventh kick would be taken by the eleventh (i.e. weakest) player of a full-strength team and the first (i.e. strongest) player of a sub-strength team.