Learn German: Zugunsten des Vereins gab es keinen Elfmeter. - In favor of the club, there was no penalty kick.

The preposition zugunsten (meaning "in favor of" or "to the benefit of") requires the genitive case. Because Verein is masculine (der Verein), its article changes to des and it takes the typical -s ending to become des Vereins.

I sometimes see this preposition spelled as two words. Is zu Gunsten also correct?

Yes! Both zugunsten and zu Gunsten are completely correct. The one-word spelling is more common in modern everyday German, but you will often see it split into two words, especially in formal or legal texts.

How would I say "in my favor" using this structure instead of "in the club's favor"?

When referring to people via pronouns, you don't use a genitive pronoun. Instead, you must split the phrase and insert a possessive adjective: zu meinen Gunsten. For "in your favor", it would be zu deinen Gunsten, and so on.

Why is the word order gab es instead of es gab?

German has a strict "verb-second" rule for main clauses. Since the entire prepositional phrase Zugunsten des Vereins takes up the first position in the sentence, the conjugated verb gab must come immediately after it. This pushes the subject es into the third position.

Why is the word for penalty kick () in the accusative case ()?