Well, just as we figured that funnier\sadder mistakes can’t happen to referees in football, Felix Brych, the poor referee in Bayer Leverkusen’s win over Hoffenheim proves us wrong.
For those of you who missed this freak goal, here’s a YouTube video that covers it:
Basically what happens is that during a Leverkusen’s corner kick, striker Stefan Kiessling gets a header towards the goal. The ball, however, fails to reach the goal, and only touches the side-net. So far, so good. Not really. What happens next is that apparently inside a hole in the net, the ball manages to snick it – getting everyone on the pitch to believe that this is actually a legitimate goal. Not even a single Hoffenfeim player or technical member protested – they all believed that this was indeed a legal goal.
The irony is that the only who did notice it was Kiessling himself. You can clearly see how he catches his head with his hands in-light of his disappointment for missing this appealing chance to score. Then, however, as he turns back, he realizes that the ball got inside. Without realizing what the hell just happened, he joined his teammates and celebrated the goal.
Now everyone, starting from the referee and ending with Kiessling himself, apologizes for this unfortunate accident. Offenheim, of course, demands a replay, considering they merely lost 2-1, meaning that this goal by fact determined the outcome of this game. No one will give them that replay of course.
The thing is, there is nothing unfortunate about this goal. On the contrary – it is very much intended by FIFA, UEFA and everyone involved in deciding football rules. How many times, exactly, do we need to see moronic, infantile, unbelievable mistakes take place in football for us to understand that electronic appliances should be integrated into this game?
If you ask FIFA, apparently, the answer is that we’re still far, far away, from a need to have computers help us making sure that the best team actually wins. As far as they’re concerned, much like Blater, FIFA’s chairman commented himself a while ago, the referee is just like a player – if a player is allowed to make a mistake, so does the referee.
That’s probably one of the dumbest comments ever made. It is just like saying that it’s ok for a judge to falsely send someone to prison. There’s no reason to help the judge make the best possible decision – no no, just like one person can accidently kill another person, so can the judge accidently send an innocent man to prison. That’s life – deal with it.
So despite the headline of this article, many many, many, years will pass by before such a funny\sad goal will surely be disallowed. Until then, may the best team lose… because the referee made a mistake. But it’s ok, players make mistakes as well.
