Phil Dowd failed to award Wigan a clear
penalty
FOOTBALL'S governing bodies are considering a bizarre
concept of using FIVE officials for every football match. New UEFA
president Michel Platini has suggested that the introduction of two
refs to patrol the penalty areas would improve the
game.
The idea has been proposed to rid the game of decisions such as
those that marred Arsenal's controverisal victory over Wigan on
Sunday. Ref Phil Dowd failed to award the Latics a clear penalty
when they were already leading - Mathieu Flamini hauling down Emile
Hesley.
To make matter worse, Arsenal equalised shortly after when Flamini
crossed the ball from a clearly offside position before Fitz Hall
diverted it into his own goal. The Gunners went on to win
2-1.
Ex-French ace Platini, 51, may now ask world governing body FIFA to
consider using two more refs alongside the main official and the
two assistants. It will be discussed at FIFA's board AGM when they
meet in Manchester next month. A UEFA spokesman said: "Two more
officials would definitely help to clear up
misunderstandings.
"Platini does not want to break up the flow of the game with video
technology but he is keen to see a new system and possible
experiments." Platini has previously said: "We have to help
referees who can't see everything and I believe two more assistants
on either side of the pitch would do this.
"It would help judging off-side decisions as well as a range of
off-the-ball incidents." Platini has dismissed using video
technology to aid decisions but is contemplating an idea to follow
rugby in only allowing each team's captain to talk directly to the
ref.
That would help stop the ugly scenes in Premiership matches when
hoardes of players crowd around in the man in black in
protest.
