France V Ireland - Wednesday, 18th November 2009 - World Cup 2010 Playoff Second Leg

**OwlsFan** · 01/12/2009, 9:29 AM

Originally Posted by Harpsbear

I feel so sorry for Martin Hansson only because he never put a foot wrong all night and in light of Sepp Blatter's blaming him I feel this has only shown Blatter to be the useless incompetent he actually is. In no way can Martin Hansson be blamed.

I haven't seen it yet on video but hope to soon. However, I believe he can be blamed to some extent as I don't think he consulted his linesman. Obviously from the Irish players' reaction there was something amiss. Perhaps in the meantime the third official could have looked at the video replay and whispered in his ear.

Originally Posted by Harpsbear

In watching the coverage I now have a better idea of the location of both the referee and his assistant and I honestly expected that Henry's handball was mre obvious than it actually was..

Sky showed the view the linesman had of the incident and it was a clear view.

ANyway, it gets stored away in the mind of the football disasters but none was as bad as this, although they all felt equally as bad at the time perhaps worse. On this occasion the whole nation and the rest of Europe are aware of the pain. In the past it was mostly just the fans attending the games or looking on from afar which made the pain a bit more personal.

**Stuttgart88** · 01/12/2009, 9:47 AM

From my view at the ground I thought the ref did go over to the linesman to consult but it was obvious that the linesman hadn't flagged for anything. Duff even ran over to the 4th official but he was having none of it.

**Junior** · 01/12/2009, 10:08 AM

Originally Posted by Stuttgart88

From my view at the ground I thought the ref did go over to the linesman to consult but it was obvious that the linesman hadn't flagged for anything. Duff even ran over to the 4th official but he was having none of it.

Yep agree. Im sure the linesman was consulted. Its been mention here on various threads as well though I havent had chance to watch the game again yet.

**paul_oshea** · 01/12/2009, 10:40 AM

the fact that the 4th official did nothing is the thing that gets me going.....think about it.

**dan o d** · 01/12/2009, 2:55 PM

we should have walked off the pitch in protest after the handball

**jbyrne** · 01/12/2009, 3:00 PM

Originally Posted by OwlsFan

I haven't seen it yet on video but hope to soon. However, I believe he can be blamed to some extent as I don't think he consulted his linesman.

and his positioning was poor to allow himself be in a position where he could not see the ball

**paul_oshea** · 01/12/2009, 4:01 PM

Originally Posted by dan o d

we should have walked off the pitch in protest after the handball

You know after the game walking out, I thought to myself what would have happened had we? Trap wouldn't have let it happen. People would call us sore losers etc etc, but I dont think they would have handed France a 3 - 0 win. It would have been a precedent and given what Henry did I'm not so sure it would have been treated as severly as some thought.

**Jicked** · 01/12/2009, 4:06 PM

Was someone booked in the aftermath of the protests, Lawrence or Duff, for going over to the 4th official? It was an awful decision from the referee, even if he didn't see it, his linesman did. He could have taken the time to go over and talk to him, or consult his 4th official, have a quiet word and say they clearly got it wrong by the amazing Irish reaction. Instead Mr Hansson said it was 100% not handball, which doesn't make sense when people try to make excuses for him that his position meant he couldn't see it...

**Thunderblaster** · 01/12/2009, 4:59 PM

Originally Posted by dan o d

we should have walked off the pitch in protest after the handball

And get fined and the game awarded 3-0 to France. We would like to walk off football pitches all the time if we do not get the rub of the green (no pun intended), but football then would be in total anarchy.

**Stuttgart88** · 01/12/2009, 5:01 PM

Originally Posted by paul_oshea

You know after the game walking out, I thought to myself what would have happened had we? Trap wouldn't have let it happen. People would call us sore losers etc etc, but I dont think they would have handed France a 3 - 0 win. It would have been a precedent and given what Henry did I'm not so sure it would have been treated as severly as some thought.

I was thinking they should have all sat down on the 18 yard line while Keane went up to Henry to ask him whether he handled it, in front of the ref.

**rambler14** · 01/12/2009, 5:03 PM

Originally Posted by dan o d

we should have walked off the pitch in protest after the handball

That would have been only worthwhile if Thierry Henry turned around to the referee and told him that he'd handeld it.

**osarusan** · 01/12/2009, 9:46 PM

Originally Posted by jbyrne

and his positioning was poor to allow himself be in a position where he could not see the ball

What position would you recommend a referee puts himself in order that he can see the ball no matter where it may bounce, and how many people are in the way?

**Emmet7** · 01/12/2009, 9:55 PM

Originally Posted by paul_oshea

You know after the game walking out, I thought to myself what would have happened had we? Trap wouldn't have let it happen. People would call us sore losers etc etc, but I dont think they would have handed France a 3 - 0 win. It would have been a precedent and given what Henry did I'm not so sure it would have been treated as severly as some thought.

I think that's something that has to be admired in Trap, his dignity throughout all of this.

I know people say forget about it, move one, but it's only two weeks ago that it happened, it's still raw. People need to work it through their system, it's not something that can be rushed.

If I was managing Ireland I would have called the players to the sideline immediately after the Henry goal and told them to tog in.

By staying on the field, we agreed to be part of something that basically wasn't sport. A match was decided by a referee who was unsighted or had a bad view and basically had a guess at it. He might as well have been blind for all the good he was.

Matches just cannot be decided by a referee who didn't see the incident in question, but instead gives the benefit of the doubt to one team or other or in most cases the home team. That's not a game of skill, it's a game of chance. Poor players depend on chance and luck. Good players rely on skill.

In any case I think it's sad that Irish supporters are going around saying we have now become and embarrassment, an international laughing stock and all that crap. The Irish team, management and supporters have nothing to be embarrassed about. It's only self-loathing types who talk about Ireland being an embarrassment. Really it's the French who should be embarrassed, qualifying in such a pathetic way.

Couldn't win it legally, so had to steal it.

And we have Irish 'fans' who condone what the French did.

**John83** · 02/12/2009, 1:41 PM

Originally Posted by osarusan

What position would you recommend a referee puts himself in order that he can see the ball no matter where it may bounce, and how many people are in the way?

Of course, there are problems with him not being close enough to the action, and you need a new ref every few minutes (particularly if we don't bother with a parachute), but obviously there are compromises in every solution.

**jbyrne** · 02/12/2009, 4:05 PM

Originally Posted by osarusan

What position would you recommend a referee puts himself in order that he can see the ball no matter where it may bounce, and how many people are in the way?

he was outside the box and in my opinion should have been in line with the penalty spot as thats clearly where the ball was going from the free kick in the position it was from. anyway, i blame the ref far less than the linesman on the far side

**captkeen** · 03/12/2009, 5:46 PM

Originally Posted by Stuttgart88

From my view at the ground I thought the ref did go over to the linesman to consult but it was obvious that the linesman hadn't flagged for anything. Duff even ran over to the 4th official but he was having none of it.

The ref did look at the linesman before he put his hand up for goal, when the ball went in i looked at the ref from the moment he walked from the goalmouth to the half way line the linesman signelled for a goal..As we were up the other end had to wait for txt to tell us it was ahnd ball..

**Emmet7** · 03/12/2009, 6:31 PM

Whether he had a clear view of it or not is kind of beside the point.

I will put it this way.

Let's say you are walking down the street and you see a beautiful woman walking towards you. Not too far from the beautiful woman is a guy robbing an old woman's handbag. But you completely miss that because you are looking at the beautiful woman, even though the other incident is happening on front of you.

The player returning from an offside position was the beautiful woman. The linesman was focused on the offside player. He never even noticed Henry. It's really that simple. A linesman cannot look at everything at once, his eyes were on the offside player.