No luck for the Irish as French cheats prosper
Begorrah. Talk about the luck of the Irish. Ireland’s football team was cruelly denied a place at next year’s World Cup in South Africa due to a blatant piece of cheating from the French this morning.
In an act of grand larceny, ex-Arsenal striker Thierry Henry – currently at Spanish giants Barcelona – handballed twice (the second time deliberately to control the ball), to set up France’s goal in a 1-1 extra time draw against the Irish in Paris this morning. France qualified for the World Cup at Ireland’s expense thanks to a 2-1 aggregate ‘win’ over two matches.
The referee and linesman failed to spot the handball despite Henry almost catching the ball at the back post before squaring to teammate William Gallas to score. Post-match, Henry decided to “be honest” (!!) and admit “the ball hit my hand” but “I am not the referee”. Who said cheats never prosper?
For the good of the game of football, this result cannot be allowed to stand.
FIFA needs to order this match to be replayed at a neutral venue. It’s an absolute disgrace and here in Australia, gives further ammunition to football’s critics to mock the game’s integrity.
Henry is a fantastic player but he’ll now be forever remembered as a cheat. Perhaps he should have a word with his former manager at Arsenal, Arsene Wenger, who offered to replay a 1999 FA Cup match against Sheffield United after a controversial winning Arsenal goal. Arsenal won that replay 2-1 but also won something far more important – the admiration of sports fans for their sense of decency.
Will the French manager, Raymond Domenech, follow his compatriot Wenger’s example and offer the Irish a replay? In the high financial stakes game of World Cup qualification, it’s doubtful. FIFA must intervene.
We’ve been here before, of course. Diego Maradona’s handball against England in the 1986 World Cup led to FIFA instigating a Fair Play campaign. It’s worthless if FIFA refuse to get some balls and order the French to replay the match.
This result sullies the game of football. If not addressed, it’s tempting to forget about football. What’s the point if this kind of cheating behaviour is rewarded at the supposed pinnacle of the sport?
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The problem with soccer on this score is that there is no natural justice option that the players can take. Do something that blatant in Rugby Union and the next time your stuck in a deep dark place at the bottom of a ruck you’ll be lucky to survive with your sight intact…
But seriously, things like this will always happen. I note the commentators in the clip you emmbedded where talking about other sports, like Cricket or Rugby, that allow video technology to be used by officials. As we all know, this hasn’t stopped games being at times decided by human error of officials.
As for teams opting to give a rematch, that is rarely possible due to scheduling even if it was realistic to expect a coach to actually take such a course.
Sport is all about high and lows, triumph and tradgedy. Sometimes the key moments are about player brilliance or a momentary loss of sanity (or morals), and sometimes it is because of officials, but we’ll never be able to change that no matter what you try and do.
I’m not an advocate of video technology being used in fast flowing sports such as football (it works well in tennis due to the breaks in play between points). As you note, Bogdanovist, not every decision is going to be correct. I can accept that as part and parcel of being a sports fan. It adds to the excitement and emotion of watching sports.
What’s really upsetting about this latest incident is the blatant cheating involved and then the complete lack of remorse from Henry and indeed the whole French team. As a fervent football fan, it’s sickening to think this is how the game is perceived by fans of other sports i.e. such cheating is now the norm in football.
I’m speculating since I don’t know much about soccer (and think it’s full of cheats and sooks without needing this kind of incident to re-inforce that), but how much of this could be due to the ultra professional nature of the sport? Is it all about results leading to greater income rather than national pride and honour? Compare this to say the underam ball incident. The Kiwis felt offended, and the Australians ashamed as a nation rather than it just reflecting the team or players. We won the series but almost universally felt that it wasn’t worth winning in the way it was.
Rightly or wrongly, the Australian national cricket, rugby and league teams are seen as ambassadors of the nation. The same could probably be said of the Socceroos, but is that how European national soccer teams are seen?
There won’t be a replay because FIFA are stubborn.
“complete lack of remorse from Henry”
He admitted that he handballed it and appollogized. People always ignore instinct in these incedences. He could have seen the ball about to cross the line and instictively stuck his hand out just like if something is about to fall of a table sometimes you can catch it instinctively. So he may not have done it diliberately.
Oh dear. One can only hope that karma will see France being bundled out of the world cup in the first round next year.
May they choke on their cheese as they surrender. (Sob!!)
If the ball were on the other foot the rematch would have been announced already. I recall the Arsenal-Sheffield incident and believe that this is as close to that as you could get.
Having just seen the damned united movie.I believe that Mr Clough may have failed in his efforts to promote the beautiful game and the do anything to win cheats have prospered.
@ajf_ Henry knew what he had done and could have pointed it out to the ref. I do not believe reflex is an excuse as he has played how many years of football without doing this but when his county’s world cup hopes are on the line his reflexes take over, sorry not buying it.
The French coach in fact complained that the press were not letting him enjoy his ill gotton gains.
Most refereed sports are developing a basic ethical problem – or perhaps it is our society that is developing this ethical problem. In situations like this, the ref or umpire is always classed as the greater villain.
It would be considered unthinkable for Henry to have walked up to the ref and told him that he should not allow the goal because he handled the ball. And yet that is what an ehtical sportsman would do.
If we all believed in ethical behaviour, there would have been no question about whether Adam Gilchrist was right or wrong in his stance on walking when out.
In our today’s society we save our greatest criticism for the police who fail to catch the criminal, rather than the criminal who committs the crime, the ref who fails to enforce the rules, rather than the player who fails to follow the rules.
The concept of the ‘professional’ free kick should be roundly condemned as deliberate cheating to stop the opposition gaining an advantage. We do not consider a lawyer who rigs a jury to be professional, or an accountant who fiddles the books, why should we consider a highly paid sportsperson, who knows the rules inside out and knows when he/she breaks them, to be ‘professional’ when they break the rules deliberately?
Professional golfers will penalise themselves when they realise they have inadvertently broken a rule, often without it being pointed out to them, and golf referees are there to consult when the rules require interpretation.
That’s how it should be in all sports, no matter how fast or furious.
Cheating is an integral part of soccer. Players dive all the time. No-one gets up in outrage about it. Often, they win the game by doing it.
The hypocrisy on display here is breathtaking.
It’s unfortunate that this is how France won the game, no doubt.
It’s also unfortunate that cheating happens in almost every game of soccer and players fake dives and hold onto their ankles in very melodramatic fasions – to only be given a penalty shot minutes later and power the ball into the back of the net using that same foot they were holding in pain only minutes earlier.
The problem here isn’t that a handball was missed (be honest, over the course of a season of any team sport these sorts of things are missed often enough), it’s that they aren’t using the technology available to them to be able to check these things.
You can’t make an exception in this case, because you’ll need to go back and look at all games during the season and see where other injustices have occured. What they need is to introduce a video ref.
Peter J Nichol is right – hypocrisy abounds, but it’s not the sole domain of soccer. Every professional sport has players who push the boundaries to get an advantage. That’s their job. AFL – full-forwards dive as if pushed in the back to get a free kick. How is this different from a player diving for a penalty or a free kick in soccer? How about rugby league or union – players will claim a try when they know they dropped the ball for a knock-on. Cheating? Different from diving in soccer? Not much.
In cricket, players will appeal when they know the batsman is not out, hoping for a wrong decision or to build pressure on batsmen and umpires, or claim a catch when they know the ball is grounded. Cheating? Likewise batsman know they nick a ball but stand their ground until given out. Cheating? Bending the rules Peter?
Peter J Nichol claims that cheats who dive for a penalty in soccer go unpunished and uncriticised. Not so – they can be carded, dismissed and suspended after recent rule changes, and are roundly criticised and ridiculed. Theirry Henry is a good example of this right now.
People who claim soccer is full of cheats relative to other sports understand neither the sport of soccer nor the sports they claim to support.
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