Ignacio Palacio Huerta

Ignacio Palacio Huerta is the economist whose penalty database drives How to win a penalty shootout (with game theory). The episode says he began collecting thousands of professional penalties in the 1990s and used that data to test whether high-stakes players behaved close to Game Theory predictions.

He becomes the practical bridge from theory to competition. Before the 2008 Champions League final, Chelsea FC asked him for a report on Manchester United penalty habits. His advice helped identify Cristiano Ronaldo’s paused-run-up pattern and Edwin van der Sar’s diving tendency, but the shootout also showed that data can create new predictability when a team follows it too uniformly.

Connections

• Beautiful Game Theory - book connected to his penalty and game-theory work.
• Mixed Strategy, Data-Driven Penalty Preparation, and Strategic Unpredictability - concepts illustrated by his database and report.
• Petr Cech, Nicolas Anelka, Chelsea FC, and Manchester United - 2008 shootout case.
• Athletic Bilbao and England National Football Team - later penalty-preparation contexts mentioned by the episode.