Regular readers of this blog will know of my love of cricket and rugby. I have never been a passionate football fan, but confess that my interest is heightened during the World Cup. But I would like to make two observations on the current World Cup in South Africa, which to be fair, journalists have covered in great detail during the last two weeks, so anything I have to say is simply a layman's observation.
In rugby football, you can have a penalty and a penalty try - a penalty try is awarded when the referee considers, but for breaking the law, the attacking side would unquestionably have scored. This is pretty rare, though quite recently against Australia, England were awarded two penalty tries. Why doesn't football have penalties when someone breaks the law, and 'penalty goals' when the referee is in no doubt that a goal would have been scored but for a defending player cheating? If such a law existed, Ghana would have reached the semi-final and not Uruguay (although frankly even with my lack of knowledge, I doubt they'd have gone much further), but the point is, that if you can win by cheating, there is something wrong with the laws of the game.
Now we turn to technology. Both rugby and cricket have relied on technology for some considerable time. In cricket, it's common in run-outs, catches, even LBWs. But back to rugby, if the referee can't decide it it's a try or not, he asks the third referee (who is sitting in front of a TV screen and able to watch the disputed try from several different angles), while he waits on the line until he hears the verdict, when he announces, 'try', or 'no try, five yard scrum'. If football had this simple technology at their disposal, England would have been 2-2 at half-time in the match against Germany. I am bound to say that having watched the match, I think Germany still would have won, but that's no excuse for allowing this incompetence to continue in the future. Mind you, as a life-long supporter of Bristol Rovers, you may feel I don't speak with a great deal of authority on the finer points of the game.
In rugby football, you can have a penalty and a penalty try - a penalty try is awarded when the referee considers, but for breaking the law, the attacking side would unquestionably have scored. This is pretty rare, though quite recently against Australia, England were awarded two penalty tries. Why doesn't football have penalties when someone breaks the law, and 'penalty goals' when the referee is in no doubt that a goal would have been scored but for a defending player cheating? If such a law existed, Ghana would have reached the semi-final and not Uruguay (although frankly even with my lack of knowledge, I doubt they'd have gone much further), but the point is, that if you can win by cheating, there is something wrong with the laws of the game.
Now we turn to technology. Both rugby and cricket have relied on technology for some considerable time. In cricket, it's common in run-outs, catches, even LBWs. But back to rugby, if the referee can't decide it it's a try or not, he asks the third referee (who is sitting in front of a TV screen and able to watch the disputed try from several different angles), while he waits on the line until he hears the verdict, when he announces, 'try', or 'no try, five yard scrum'. If football had this simple technology at their disposal, England would have been 2-2 at half-time in the match against Germany. I am bound to say that having watched the match, I think Germany still would have won, but that's no excuse for allowing this incompetence to continue in the future. Mind you, as a life-long supporter of Bristol Rovers, you may feel I don't speak with a great deal of authority on the finer points of the game.
8 Comments:
Its Uruguay, my lord...not Paraguay.
Hey Jeffrey,
Could you please explain me the ending of the short story - better the devil you know' in the new book 'And thereby hangs a tale"
The technology has also been introduced in tennis, because One line decision makes a DIFFERENCE. As the official statistics go, they claimed 96% of all decisions were right, but if England were 2-2 the whole tempo of the game would have changed, and who knows what the final score might have been. This technology should have been introduced in football since the infamous 'hand of god' incident in 86.
Cheers
Hi Jeffrey,
You are right. It's about time football used technology to bring justice to players and their nations.
I have a blog. do visit http://johnpmathew.blogspot.com. Let me know what you think.
Best
John
dew - in simple terms - the 'bad' boss swapped his mind and character with the younger man's body thinking he'd have his life over - but it didn't quite work out like that....
Sachal - I agree.
Jeffrey, does it have to be Bristol Rovers the next time you are in Bristol I would be honoured if you could accompany me to Ashton Gate to watch Bristol City, perhaps you could be converted?
Speed and tackling techniques are the beauty of this game. Some of the authorities may believe that the speed will be hampered if the game been controlled by the technical gadgets. Things are changing and it may be imposed in next W/C
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