Thank you Kevin

Since listening to Freakonomic's podcast "World Cup Edition" I can summarize the points made so you don't have listen for 8:44 minutes. The second part was just game theory to PKs which we've already covered. The one addition they make to that conversation, is that kickers should kick to the center, cause one of the payoffs for the two players is not to look foolish which is not typically taken into consideration. A recap on the last game theory post:

So there's a lesson here, and it's pretty much (just to make the lesson resonate again): imagine there you are in the World Cup, you're playing for England, you have to justify your actions not only to your teammates and your manager, and your boss, but to about 60 million rather angry fans. What's the lesson here? I'm hoping it was going to be obvious, what's the lesson here? The lesson is, do not shoot to the middle. Let me qualify that lesson slightly, unless you're German. Germans can do whatever they like.

Noticeably, players also don't follow Levitt's advice, accountably for his explanation of the private payoff. Except maybe the Germans. Of note, when Levitt's in the World Cup next, goalies go for the left, as he won't be following his advice either.

The first point though: home field advantage. One aspect of this is there are two types of soccer stadiums, those exclusively designed for soccer and those which are multipurpose, e.g. track and field. The former has a much larger advantage, ostensibly for a referee intimidation factor. This is measured among others in divergences in stoppage time allotted. So basically, the close presence of the fans bullies the refs into favorably calling for the home team.