Luck Of The Irish (Live) – John Lennon (from the Anthology set which, BTW is totally awesome and an essential purchase for any serious Lennon fan)
Perhaps this will be the thing to finally convince people that the lack of video replay in the game is a relic of past ages and a massive dis-service to the players who invest years of their lives in the game, and the supporters who live and die with their national team.
Sure, France had a legitimate shout for a penalty a few minutes earlier. And of course we don’t know that Ireland would have won in the penalty shootout. But we ought to have been given the chance to find out, don’t you think?
I’m a luddite on a lot of things. I get the general aesthetic rejection of video replay. But c’mon. There are ways to incorporate technology in limited ways to improve the quality of the game. When everyone in the world knows that it’s a handball except for the four referees, it’s a travesty and a mockery of the idea that we’re watching a fair and legitimate game.
A lot of people have been calling for Henry’s head. I can understand the sentiment but don’t agree. It’s not his fault the system is so broken. And while it would have been a monumentally impressive act of sportsmanship for him to own up, there’s not actually all that much he could have done. Reports conflict about whether he told the ref he handled the ball – I suppose he could have jumped up and down about it – but if the ref is insistent that it’s a valid goal, there is literally no one who can fix things. You can’t even decide as France to give Ireland a free goal. Thanks to the away goals rule, as soon as France put a 1 on the board penalties were off the table.
For me, this is a situation where the system is broken. And it doesn’t do any good to complain about individual failures when it all happens in the backdrop of a structure that doesn’t work. The focus should be on actually fixing the real problem, not searching for villains.
Sort of like how I feel about the Senate.