Journal article: The paper analyses sequences of penalty kicks during football shoot-outs in French cup competitions. We consider the psychological effects to which the kicker is subject: the “fear” of winning, the “fear” of losing, and the “fear” of catching up his opponent. Our main conclusion is that the performance (the probability of scoring) is negatively affected by both what is at stake and the difficulty of the situation. We find no advantage for the team that takes the first kick.