A Day of Shame for World Cup Referees

It was as if England goalkeeper Robert Green played twice on the same day and twice managed to let a simple shot bounce comically off his hands and into the goal.

How likely would that have been?

Can there ever have been a day in which two World Cup games were so fundamentally altered by two decisions that were, to most naked, neutral and living eyes, as wrong as a head of state dropping his trousers to sing his national anthem?

Is it truly possible that far too many officials in these World Cup finals are distant cousins of Jim Joyce, the umpire who took away a perfect Detroit Tigers game with a perfectly awful call?

Both of Sunday's games--England/Germany and Argentina/Mexico--were fundamentally affected by terrible first half calls from assistant referees.

The word "terrible" somehow seems inadequate.

In the England game, the Uruguayan assistant referee was perfectly positioned to see that Frank Lampard's shot was more than a yard over the line.

Were his eyes shut? Or was his mind?

That game would have gone to 2-2, a charitable score given Germany's superiority, but the right one.

These things happen once in a lifetime, though.

Or, perhaps, as Sunday proved, twice in a day.

Mexico was holding favorite Argentina until another decision that will make some merely embarrassed for the assistant referee and others consider that there is something a little more nefarious with its hand on the assistants' flags.

Carlos Tevez was not merely slightly offside. There was room for at least two Carlos Tevezes between him and the last defenders.

The charitable, the hopeful and the sycophantic will say that, in each case, the best team won in the end.

But football is emotional. A team can be sailing one minute and sunk the next.

England and Mexico both did something right.

The former scored, the latter moved up to leave Tevez offside. They were punished for being right.

Those more fond of theories that involve hushed conspiracies and manipulative dealings, might offer that calls such as these seem so often to go against certain teams.

The last time Germany suffered one of these seems like 1966. The last time Argentina suffered one of these was in the 1990 World Cup final.

Strangely, it was playing the more fancied Germany.

Yet countries like the U.S (name your World Cup) and England (Hand of God) seem to have had a little more than their unfair share.

Perhaps they are merely unlucky. Perhaps not.

FIFA's explanation that it doesn't want to see technology in the game lives in that area in which the odd co-habits with the blind and the untrustworthy.

The officials are currently linked to each other--and this includes the fourth referee, whose intervention turned the 2006 World Cup final--by microphones and headphones.

Does FIFA truly not categorize this as technology? Are these merely toys?

What would prevent an official in a plush box with a nice HD TV also being linked by these frighteningly modern devices to the referee?

"Hey, stupid. The ball was over line. My Mother could see that. And she's in Budapest." he might whisper.

Or perhaps: "Oh my Gawd...did you see how far offside Tevez was? How many beers did you down last night?"

This wouldn't make the game last longer.

After the Argentina/Mexico offside decision, the Italian referee enjoyed a long, spirited chinwag with his assistant from the same country.

And still they got it wrong.

How long before FIFA digs itself out of the mid-20th century, and staggers into the 21stt?

Or does it somehow suit it not to?

Chris Matyszczyk is an award-winning creative director who advises major corporations on content creation and marketing, and an avid sports fan. He is also the author of the popular CNET blog Technically Incorrect.

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