FIFA Must Adopt Instant Replay

Instant replay arrived in world soccer on Sunday. It became absolutely essential when the field officials totally missed the shot from England’s Frank Lampard that hit the crossbar and bounced close to two feet inside the goal.

The referee and the linesman were fully 25 yards away, but television cameras instantly told everybody around the world that the ball had gone into the goal and that England should have tied the score 38 minutes into the first half of its Round of 16 match.

The blown call did not change history, because (in the end) Germany pummeled England, 4-1 (but you can argue the point - the error influenced the outcome). But the glaring mistake was a reminder that soccer goals — more than baseball home runs or football touchdowns or even hockey goals — are too precious to be squandered. Those three sports now have some version of instant replay in North America. It’s time for soccer, too — at least where television and big bucks are present. And surely by the World Cup, next time, in 2014, in Brazil.

That view of Lampard’s hard drive was so clear, so available, that any FIFA monitor in the stadium could have seen it on first view, clicked for an instant replay and stopped play to reverse the noncall. FIFA has been grudgingly saying that electronic review of the goal might take place by the 2014 World Cup, maybe, you never know. But Sunday’s missed goal should make it mandatory.

This gross error was the opposite of the disputed call in the famous 1966 World Cup final when Geoff Hurst of England hit a shot in overtime that hit on or close to the line. The official signaled for a goal and England went on to beat West Germany, 4-2. People still argue and interpret the Hurst goal. But the call on Lampard’s goal is more obvious.

On June 3, Jim Joyce, one of the better umpires in Major League Baseball, missed an obvious call on what would have been the 27th and final out, costing Armando Galarraga, a pitcher with Detroit, a rare perfect game. Many fans (but few baseball people) demanded the call be overturned and used the acknowledged mistake as a reason for instant replay. But I argued against it, and still do, because umpires’ imperfections are part of the sport.

The same goes for soccer. The sport can live with refs being snookered by dives or hidden fouls. But a blatant, if honest, mistake on a rare goal? That can be judged, like a disputed home run over a fence 350 feet away.

Up to now, I have argued that soccer can ignore technology and just let the calls be part of the match. Never stop the game, because that leads to television sticking its grubby commercials where they do not belong. But if everybody around the world saw Lampard’s shot obviously bounce into the goal, I say it is time to initiate technology for goal calls. Otherwise, let ’em run.

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England vs. U.S. in Legos

In case you missed the U.S.'s "victory" over England over the weekend, you're in luck. The website Lego Fussball has gone through the trouble of recreating the key plays with Legos. Unlike the actual game, we all win in this one. (via Guardian)

Will England show up to play?

South African teenagers in red Liverpool jerseys and Manchester United sweatshirts jumped up and down with vuvuzela-blowing compatriots wearing Bafana Bafana shirts. They were all shrieking the names of England’s players: Gerrard. Rooney. Terry. Especially John Terry.

“I think we realized today it’s another step up actually in game mode,” said Terry, the Chelsea captain. “Coming here, getting changed in the kit, and the stadium as well. We’ve enjoyed that part of it.”

Chelsea is big here. The Premier League champion is an international brand with well-known African spokesmen: Didier Drogba, Michael Essien, Jon Obi Mikel. The latter two won’t be playing in the World Cup, and Drogba might not either, but Terry will. Ivory Coast, Ghana, Nigeria and the host team have little chance to win the championship. But England might.

The older South African fans here at Moruleng Stadium in North West Province, a mining area, were mostly men, dressed in slacks or jeans and collared shirts. They were supporting the local team, Platinum Stars, who were given a dream assignment: Give the guys from England a run around.

Firm applause and baritone chants greeted the Stars every time they pushed forward or ventured a shot on goal, of which there were a few. The Stars, who finished 14th in the South African Premier League last season, did their best, but they were no match for the Premier League players of England.

“It wasn’t a case of us coming here and wanting to win 8- or 9-nil, or 4- or 5-nil,” Terry said after England won, 3-0. “We were coming here to get the right preparation and take a lot of things from the game.”

“I’m sure the manager will look back on the first half, especially, and not be happy with that,” said Terry, who was among 10 starters substituted at halftime. “I’m sure we’ll sit down and go through it like we do every game and dig a few holes in our performance.”

There were more than a few, and they did not escape the notice of the United States assistant coaches watching from the stands. The Americans will face England on Saturday in nearby Rustenburg.

“I feel like I know these guys so well already,” one U.S. assistant coach said before making his way out of the stadium ahead of the crowd.

The scouting report he will deliver to Coach Bob Bradley won’t say anything new, but it will confirm some suspicions:

*Center back Ledley King, who has chronic knee problems and trains only two days a week, is less intimidating than Rio Ferdinand, the injured England captain.

*Michael Dawson, King’s Tottenham teammate and Ferdinand’s replacement on the roster, might have had a great season with Spurs, but he needs to find his international footing with his England teammates.

The game re-emphasized other things:

*Aaron Lennon is more dangerous on the right wing than Shaun Wright-Philips because he can run at defenders and effectively cross the ball, while Wright-Philips can only do the former. The pace of either Lennon or Wright-Phillips will be a challenge for the American captain Carlos Bocanegra, who is expected to play left fullback on Saturday.

England Coach Fabio Capello will give his players a detailed assessment of their performance, and he is likely displeased.

Each time a ball was misplayed or an England player was out of sync with a teammate, one of them looked over to the bench at a visibly perturbed Capello. This happened often. England was slow, which was what this mismatched game prescribed. Is that the best preparation five days before the start of the World Cup?

“The manger is a great coach and all he wants to do is win,” said Jermain Defoe, who scored England’s first goal. “He gets you fired up before the games.”

The only England player who didn’t seem to care what the coach thought of him was Rooney. He came on at halftime and played as if it were a cup final. Rooney has no dimmer switch – it’s either on or off. He worked the referee, went in for tackles when he lost the ball and even earned a yellow card before scoring England’s final goal.

Rooney is a known quantity. Unknown is who will start alongside him up front against the United States. It was Emile Heskey on Monday, and he was active. But Defoe scored, in the third minute, and Peter Crouch is a tall, complementary player who won’t get in Rooney’s way. He likes to play higher up, while Rooney, who prefers to get a lot of touches on the ball, prefers to come back into the midfield to get it.

The only field player who played both halves of the game was Joe Cole, on the left flank. James Milner, who came on in the second half, was quick, but appeared to occupy the same space on the field as Cole. It’s unlikely that they will be in the same lineup, but both could play against the United States.

What do you expect from England on Saturday? Does Capello have the team wound too tight? Or will he get them in sync and match ready?

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Rooney all grown up and ready to lead England

The life and times of Wayne Rooney, England’s star and star-crossed forward, can be floridly traced in the body art of his tattoos.

On his right forearm is inked “Just Enough Education to Perform.” It is an album tribute to his favorite band, the Stereophonics, but also perhaps an unintended confirmation of his petulant, hot-headed youth.

When last seen in the World Cup four years ago, Rooney was being ejected for doing a Portuguese folk dance on the groin of defender Ricardo Carvalho in the quarterfinals. England exited in that same match against Portugal on penalty kicks.

“He had a bit of a temper; he lost his head seemingly in important situations, but it’s something he’s gotten control over,” said Jonathan Spector, a defender with the United States, which will face Rooney and England on June 12 in Rustenburg, South Africa.

“In the past, players tried to get into his head, knowing he could snap,” said Spector, who plays for West Ham United in the English Premier League. “It doesn’t seem to happen anymore.”

A sign of Rooney’s newfound maturity at 24, we are assured, is fatherhood. After an exhibition match last week, Rooney unveiled on his back a tattoo of praying hands and angels’ wings etched with the name of his 6-month-old son, Kai.

As the World Cup approaches, Rooney is widely considered the planet’s second-best soccer player behind Lionel Messi of Argentina. He enters the tournament having scored 34 goals in all competitions this past season for Manchester United, shouldering greater responsibility after Cristiano Ronaldo left for Real Madrid.

Older and wiser is how Rooney described himself at a news conference last month in London. By this he presumably meant that he is no longer encumbered by stories of his admitted visits to prostitutes as a teenager; libelous tabloid accusations (for which he won a lawsuit in 2006) that he had slapped his wife, Coleen (then his fiancée), in a nightclub; or reports of gambling losses that surpassed $1 million in one spree.

On the field, this son of a Liverpool family of amateur boxers has curbed his pugilistic instincts. And he has also apparently toned down his baroque oratorical style (he is once said to have used a certain word more than 20 times in 60 seconds during a Socratic parry with a referee).

“You are excited and emotional when you make decisions, but now I have matured on and off the pitch,” Rooney said at the news conference. “Now I probably take my anger out during training the week before the game.”

On his left arm, Rooney has another tattoo, the St. George’s Cross of England. The red cross on a white field will be flown proudly and nervously by England’s supporters during the World Cup in hopes that Rooney’s X-rays and magnetic resonance imaging scans will not become more prominent news than his tattoos.

Rooney’s knee, ankle and groin injuries in the last two months have put England in a familiar and conflicted position — hoping to win the World Cup, fearing things will end too early, as they have since a triumph on home soil in 1966.

Landon Donovan, the American midfielder, has said that Rooney seems “worn out” after a long club season. Fabio Capello has declared Rooney “100 percent” fit. Capello is England’s manager, not a doctor or a palm reader. A country expectantly and fretfully waits. Perhaps none of the World Cup contenders are as dependent on one player as England is on Rooney.

With him in good health, the Three Lions could reach the final or even win. If his body breaks down — Rooney broke a toe in the 2004 European championships and just before the 2006 World Cup — many feel that England’s chances will be equally fractured.

“The whole country would go into mourning,” said Barry Glendenning, a soccer writer for The Guardian.

Chunky and meaty-faced, Rooney was conspicuously absent from the group of sculptured international soccer stars photographed for the June issue of Vanity Fair magazine. But he relies on six-shooter legs, not six-pack abs. At his best, Rooney is an incessant worker, deceptively fast on the ball, instinctual in finding a sliver of space, solid in the air, able to shoot from anywhere and increasingly smarter about his runs into the box.

“Maturity is one of the final parts of a player’s development,” Manchester United Manager Alex Ferguson said. “You have to wait until their mid-20s before they get that authority, timing, the maturity, to do things that those qualities bring. This season, he accepted the fact that to get the best out of himself, he had to conserve his energies for the best part of the pitch — the penalty box area.”

Nine of the 23 Americans on the World Cup roster played in England this past season, so the United States will be more than familiar with Rooney. Man-marking him is too risky, several of the Americans said.

“They have too many other players who can hurt you,” Spector said. “You get dragged out of position and they’ll find the gaps.”

Instead, the Americans will have to rely on discipline and a collective, unyielding effort from a defense left uncertain by injury. They will have to challenge Rooney’s first touch and challenge themselves to work as hard as he will.

“If you know where he is at all times and you do that for 90 minutes, you should be O.K.,” said goalkeeper Brad Guzan, who plays for Aston Villa. “If you do it for 89 minutes, he’ll find a way to punish you.”

In the past, said goalkeeper Marcus Hahnemann, who plays for Wolverhampton, Rooney’s Vesuvian eruptions were regular and predictable enough to mark with an egg timer.

“The bad thing is now he’s controlling his temper,” Hahnemann said.

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