Whenever there is a controversial goal line decision at a televised football match, I always get asked the question, when is the FA going to install goal line technology?
With all the miracles they achieve with electronics these days it ought not to be an insurmountable problem. The truth is that if it was left to the FA we would no doubt have it by now or at least it would be on trial. At last year’s International FA Board meeting, the FA went along with glowing references for the Hawkeye system which had made a convincing presentation of its capabilities.
However FIFA quashed any question of
trialing this or any other system which indicated when the ball has crossed the goal line.
This year, at the International Board meeting in Geneva, the question was again on the agenda but afterwards the Secretary General of FIFA,
Sepp Blatter, made an announcement at a press conference. ‘The International FA Board,’ he said, ‘has decided not to pursue goal line technology and to no longer continue with experiments in that area. This is a discussion that has been going on for a long time at FIFA and in the associations that make up the International Board. We based our decision today on all those thought processes. If we introduced it for goal line decisions why not for offsides and other situations. We don’t want the game to be interrupted countless times.’ (Of course that wasn’t what was proposed). He went on, ‘the question posed to the members of the Board was simple: should we introduce technology into football or not. The answer from the majority of members was no, even if it was not unanimous.’
This last admission that not all members voted against technology is interesting. The make-up of the Board, which as the spokesman for FIFA pointed out ‘is the guardian of the Laws’, owes more to history than anything else. There are eight members, one for each of the football associations of England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland and four from FIFA representing the rest of the footballing world. Any change to the
Laws of the Game has to be passed by a majority of at least two thirds, which means FIFA always has the veto. It is intriguing to guess who were the dissenting voices at the meeting, especially after reading the comments from some of the others members afterwards, which also give a clue as to why the decision was taken.
The first thing to say is that it was not a straightforward technological decision. Ian Watmore of the FA said, ‘We are conscious of how the public may react. We saw demonstrations which had a lot in their favour and it was all very positive but the question we asked ourselves was whether the future of football was tied up with technology and the answer was no.’ Has the FA has changed it’s mind?
Apparently, how the decision was arrived at revolved around the philosophy of the game. ‘The human aspect of football is essential,’ said Jonathan Ford of the Football Association of Wales. ‘The big moments in this sport – whatever they are – get spectators talking and go down in history. That what makes the sport so vibrant’. Patrick Nelson of the Irish Football Association backed him saying, ‘We were all agreed that technology shouldn’t enter football because we want football to remain human, which is what makes it great. The fans keep talking about these matches again and again and relive them.’
So you can see that the decision not to have goal line technology to help referees and their assistants to get this vital decision right in important games, is solely down to you - the fans. If referees always
got it right, what would you have to talk about?
Dick Sawdon Smith
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