FOOTBALL fans spotted Jordan Pickford’s “penalty cheat sheet” on his water bottle before he saved James Maddison’s spot-kick.
Leicester were given a golden chance to move into a 3-1 lead against Everton before half-time on Monday night when Michael Keane blocked Harvey Barnes’ cross with his arm.
GettyJordan Pickford saved James Maddison’s penalty on Monday evening[/caption]
Sky SportsHis data-filled water bottle was spotted by the Sky Sports cameras[/caption]
Maddison stepped up to face England team-mate Pickford from 12 yards.
But his effort straight down the middle was parried away by the Three Lions No1.
Fans were quick to point out afterwards that Pickford had his trusty water bottle with the penalty information written on it.
He had data for Maddison, Youri Tielemans and Jamie Vardy on the bottle.
And the stats for Maddison said that he goes down the middle 60 per cent of the time, with the instruction on the bottle telling Pickford to “stay centre”.
Commented on it at full-time, Pickford told Sky Sports: “Madders, he needs to learn his lesson! He doesn’t play poker by the sounds of it.
“Nah, to be fair, I do my homework. I called it this morning which way I was going to go.
“He expects me to dive so I’ve double bluffed him and got one up on him.”
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The ex-Sunderland man, 29, had similar data on his bottle when Everton faced Liverpool back in February.
And prior to that he used the trick during England’s 2018 World Cup shoot-out against Colombia and the Euro 2020 final against Italy.
Reacting on social media, one person said: “Love this. Pickford does his homework an is brave enough to stand up and not dive to one side or the other.
“And to everyone saying it’s an awful pen, if Pickford dives either way and he drills it down the middle then yes we would be saying it’s a great pen. It’s a top save .”
Another added: “Decent information. Clear, simple, effective.”
A third replied: “That’s why you do your homework .”
And a fourth responded: “That’s really clever s***housery. Will get inside takers heads.”