FIFA President Blatter aplogizes to England and Mexico, says replay will be considered

[Upton]

With pressure for video replay mounting after two blatant missed calls at the World Cup, FIFA president Sepp Blatter said soccer's governing body will reopen the issue after the tournament.

Blatter said Tuesday that FIFA deplores "when you see the evidence of refereeing mistakes." It would be "a nonsense" not to consider changes, he said.

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Blatter, who attended both matches, said he had apologized to English and Mexican soccer officials.

"After having witnessed such a situation," Blatter said, referring to England's non-goal against Germany, "we have to open again this file, definitely."

He said the International Football Association Board would consider changes at a July meeting in Cardiff, Wales.

http://nbcsports.msnbc.com/id/37992436/ns/sports-world_cup/

From what I just saw on ESPN, I think Blatter is just referring to some kind of goal line technology, which would have helped England but not Mexico. Anyway, Blatter is under a lot of media pressure right now, he had to say something. I won't believe there's going to be any real changes until I actually see them..

[oldironside]

1. When you put replay in the headline, I thought...

... they would have to fetch the English and Mexican teams back to South Africa.

Still, it is laughable that FIFA's flagship tournament can suffer this sort of thing. Ho hum.

[Upton]

2. Why would you think

that refereeing mistakes are laughable? Are you an advocate of instant replay or perhaps one of those ugly Americans that hate the World Cup?

[oldironside]

5. I've been called many things in my life...

... but never an ugly American. For the record, I'm English, although I do live in Germany.

Of course people are going to make mistakes, but when it comes to the possible results of two knockout games being influenced by crass errors that everyone else in the stadium saw, it doesn't inspire much confidence. As Kickeronline put it, it was unbelievable that the ref didn't give the England goal and it was the turning point of the game. Not just my view. Ask Maradonna, Netzer, Breitner, et al.

As for video replays, we had pretty much this argument over substitutes all those years ago. Traditionalists said it would make the game a farce and cause chaos. They also argued that injuries were an important part of the game and that only by playing ten against eleven could a team show it's true quality. As one headline of the time put it, I Want To See Fight, Not Fakes. Not an argument that carries much weight now.

[hughee99]

3. I'll bet their "fix" will be that they'll no longer allow replay on the Jumbotron

in the stadium. FIFA has seemed pretty comfortable with allowing refs to run and hide after a bad call, they just don't want to have them have to deal with seeing their screw-up on screen just moments after, and having an entire stadium of people be SURE they got it wrong, while the game is still going on. FIFA will do exactly nothing about bad calls until it starts to cost them money.

[Codeine]

4. I'm against replays,

but goal line technology makes a ton of sense, and won't impact the pace of the game at all.

[redqueen]

7. I used to be against replays, but no more.

If they can let these guys roll around on the ground for several minutes, they can take a minute to check a call.

[joeybee12]

6. Not gonna happen, FIFA is run by a bunch of old farts...

...they hate change.