The Mystery Solved! Vinicius Becomes Real Madrid’s New Penalty Taker and Scores His 50th Goal in La Liga

In the third round of La Liga, Real Madrid drew 1-1 away with Las Palmas. Although Real Madrid failed to secure a win in this match, one mystery was solved: who would be taking penalties for Real Madrid in the new season. In this game, it wasn’t Mbappe but Vinicius who took on the responsibility of penalty kicks for Real Madrid, helping the team equalize the score.

At the beginning of the pre-season, Real Madrid’s coaching staff started working on detailed plans for the 2024/25 season. One of the important tasks was to find a player within the squad capable of filling a key role in Ancelotti’s tactical system—the set-piece taker. With Kroos’s departure, Davide Ancelotti and Francesco Mauri were responsible for reformulating tactical schemes, facing the significant challenge of filling this void.

Kroos had always been an all-around master of set-pieces, handling various types including corner kicks, direct free-kicks, penalties, and throw-ins. To cope with Kroos’s departure, Real Madrid adopted a new strategy, distributing these responsibilities among different players. For example, direct free-kicks were given to Valverde, while corners and flank free-kicks were assigned to Guler and Rodrigo. As for the penalty taker, although Mbappe joined the team, there was never any controversy over this issue.

Despite Mbappe being an outstanding set-piece specialist and having been the first-choice penalty taker in every team he played for previously, at Real Madrid, he needed to be patient. The hierarchy within the club is very clear, and currently, the first-choice penalty taker is Vinicius. This Brazilian star strengthened his shooting technique under the guidance of the coach during the U.S. tour, which made his position almost unshakable.

At the Gran Canaria Stadium, Vinicius took Real Madrid’s first penalty of the 2024/25 season. After the referee awarded the penalty, he confidently stepped up, delivering a powerful shot that flew past Cillessen into the middle of the goal, leveling the score at 1-1. With this goal, Vinicius reached 50 goals in La Liga, steadily climbing the scoring charts at Real Madrid. Unfortunately, besides this goal, he did not score in open play, and thus Real Madrid failed to secure a victory.