Ademola Lookman was criticized by his manager Gian Piero Gasperini last night following the club’s exit from the Champions League. Atalanta lost at home against Club Brugge 3-1 on Tuesday night in Bergamo after losing the first leg in Brugge 2-1.
The Italian club were down 3-0 before Ademola Lookman came on to hand his team a lifeline, and also missed a penalty minutes later. Lookman’s penalty miss did not go over well with manager Gasperini as the Italian manager criticized the 2024 African Footballer of the year:
“Ademola Lookman is one of the worst penalty takers I’ve ever seen”. “He wanted to take the penalty after scoring a goal, he took the ball despite Retegui and De Keteleare available to take it… I didn’t like what Lookman did”.
Following his comments, we dug around and found Ademola Lookman’s career stats on penalties.
Ademola Lookman’s Career Penalties Record
Ademola Lookman has only taken 6 penalties in his professional club career. He has scored 4 and missed 2 (including the one from last night). Lookman has previously scored 4 of his last 4 penalties he took for Atalanta, and has never missed a penalty kick at the club until last night.
Lookman’s Response After Gasperini’s Criticism
The Nigerian star released a statement following his manager’s controversial comments last night via his social media page:
“It saddens me on a day like this to have to write this statement – most of all because of what we have achieved together as a team and as a city.
Along with our incredible fans, we as a team are hurting too with last night’s result. During the match, the designated penalty taker instructed me to take the penalty; and to support the team I took responsibility in the moment to do so.”
