With the opening of Euro 2000 just a week away, the English team could yet benefit from some timely assistance with their most recurring failure - penalty shoot-outs.

A new computer facility which opened this week at Swansea University uses 3-D slow-motion analysis to chart the movements of a player's body when taking penalty kicks. After a succession of crucial misses in recent years, most memorably by Chris Waddle, Stuart Pearce and Gareth Southgate, that's a lesson which may prove highly productive for Kevin Keegan's men.

Apparently, the technology can show the best way to fool the goalkeeper and avoid giving away clues as to which way and how hard players are going to kick the ball. It's not clear yet whether the team will get to visit the facility before they head off to Euro 2000, but booking the team in for a session could prove to be one of Keegan's better decisions.