Ademola Lookman: From panenka miss to Champions League quarter-final hero
How a boy from Wandsworth who once had no food at home became the man who put Atletico Madrid in the Champions League semifinals
In 2020, Ademola Lookman ran up to take a penalty for Fulham against West Ham and chipped it straight into the goalkeeper’s hands. The audacity of the attempt — a panenka, softly dinked, trying to read the keeper — only for it to go exactly where the keeper stayed. Lukasz Fabianski had already dived, had time to get back to his feet, and caught it comfortably. The final whistle blew seconds later.
Lookman crouched down and covered his face with his hands.
Gian Piero Gasperini, who would later manage him at Atalanta, called him one of the worst penalty takers he had ever seen. Years later, Lookman spoke about that night in London. “It’s about turning your pain into power,” he said. “Life may knock you down, and it may not deal you the best cards.”
On Tuesday night at the Metropolitano, Lookman didn’t take a penalty. He didn’t need one.
Barcelona arrived needing two goals to overturn Atletico’s first-leg lead. They had them inside 24 minutes — Lamine Yamal in the 4th, Ferran Torres in the 24th — the Metropolitano briefly silenced, 69,000 people doing the math. Two-two on aggregate. Everything Atletico had built in Barcelona the week before, gone.
Then Marcos Llorente found space on the right. The ball came to Lookman with Jules Kounde tight to him and Joan Garcia in front of him. He hit it anyway.
Atletico were through.
He is 28. He is from Wandsworth, south London, where he grew up in a house that sometimes had no food, and would stay at friends’ homes after football just to eat. He played for England’s under-19s and under-21s and never made the senior squad. He went to Charlton, Everton, Fulham on loan, Leicester on loan, RB Leipzig, Atalanta — the kind of career where you never quite stay long enough to feel settled.
At Atalanta, in the 2024 Europa League final in Dublin against Bayer Leverkusen — the Leverkusen side that had gone the entire season unbeaten — Lookman scored a hat-trick. It was the highest point of his career, and still not quite enough to make him feel like he belonged. Inter Milan came calling that summer. Atalanta blocked the move. He refused to report for pre-season. Then came a confrontation with his manager Ivan Juric on the touchline, a shove after being substituted. The relationship that had produced that night in Dublin had turned into something neither side wanted.
ALSO READ | ‘This was a robbery’: Raphinha lashes out at referees as Barcelona’s Champions League dream ends in red card chaos
In January 2026, Atalanta sold him to Atletico for 40 million euros. He scored on his debut against Real Betis. In the months that followed: six goals, four assists — a player who had, quietly, already made himself at home.
“As the game is going on,” he said after Tuesday’s match, “moments happen in the game.”
The moment that came was this: a counter-attack, a pass from Llorente, a finish with a defender right on him. The kind of moment that either freezes a player or doesn’t. For Lookman, in the 31st minute, in front of 69,000 people with everything level, it didn’t. Atletico return to the Champions League semifinals for the first time since 2017. The boy from Wandsworth who once ate at other people’s tables put them there.
Six years ago at the Olympic Stadium, after the miss, he covered his face with his hands. On Tuesday night at the Metropolitano, those same hands were in the air.
In 2020, Ademola Lookman ran up to take a penalty for Fulham against West Ham and chipped it straight into the goalkeeper’s hands. The audacity of the attempt — a panenka, softly dinked, trying to read the keeper — only for it to go exactly where the keeper stayed. Lukasz Fabianski had already dived, had time to get back to his feet, and caught it comfortably. The final whistle blew seconds later.
Lookman crouched down and covered his face with his hands.
Gian Piero Gasperini, who would later manage him at Atalanta, called him one of the worst penalty takers he had ever seen. Years later, Lookman spoke about that night in London. “It’s about turning your pain into power,” he said. “Life may knock you down, and it may not deal you the best cards.”
On Tuesday night at the Metropolitano, Lookman didn’t take a penalty. He didn’t need one.
Barcelona arrived needing two goals to overturn Atletico’s first-leg lead. They had them inside 24 minutes — Lamine Yamal in the 4th, Ferran Torres in the 24th — the Metropolitano briefly silenced, 69,000 people doing the math. Two-two on aggregate. Everything Atletico had built in Barcelona the week before, gone.
Then Marcos Llorente found space on the right. The ball came to Lookman with Jules Kounde tight to him and Joan Garcia in front of him. He hit it anyway.
Atletico were through.
He is 28. He is from Wandsworth, south London, where he grew up in a house that sometimes had no food, and would stay at friends’ homes after football just to eat. He played for England’s under-19s and under-21s and never made the senior squad. He went to Charlton, Everton, Fulham on loan, Leicester on loan, RB Leipzig, Atalanta — the kind of career where you never quite stay long enough to feel settled.
At Atalanta, in the 2024 Europa League final in Dublin against Bayer Leverkusen — the Leverkusen side that had gone the entire season unbeaten — Lookman scored a hat-trick. It was the highest point of his career, and still not quite enough to make him feel like he belonged. Inter Milan came calling that summer. Atalanta blocked the move. He refused to report for pre-season. Then came a confrontation with his manager Ivan Juric on the touchline, a shove after being substituted. The relationship that had produced that night in Dublin had turned into something neither side wanted.
ALSO READ | ‘This was a robbery’: Raphinha lashes out at referees as Barcelona’s Champions League dream ends in red card chaos
In January 2026, Atalanta sold him to Atletico for 40 million euros. He scored on his debut against Real Betis. In the months that followed: six goals, four assists — a player who had, quietly, already made himself at home.
“As the game is going on,” he said after Tuesday’s match, “moments happen in the game.”
The moment that came was this: a counter-attack, a pass from Llorente, a finish with a defender right on him. The kind of moment that either freezes a player or doesn’t. For Lookman, in the 31st minute, in front of 69,000 people with everything level, it didn’t. Atletico return to the Champions League semifinals for the first time since 2017. The boy from Wandsworth who once ate at other people’s tables put them there.
Six years ago at the Olympic Stadium, after the miss, he covered his face with his hands. On Tuesday night at the Metropolitano, those same hands were in the air.
