Asia PR News

BERLIN, 29 June /PA/ –

The World Cup has now reached the quarter-final stages and here are some of
the tournament’s controversies over the past seven days:

LAST-GASP SPOT-KICK DRAMA

Italy, reduced to 10 men in their second-round clash with Australia, were
facing a potentially difficult 30 minutes of extra-time when they were awarded
a dramatic injury-time penalty. Lucas Neill slid in rashly with just eight
seconds of the added three minutes remaining and gave Fabio Grosso the
opportunity to fall over his body. The referee saw it as a foul and Francesco
Totti settled the match.

GRAHAM POLL PLAYS HIS CARDS WRONG

The standard of refereeing at the tournament was praised early on but all
that has changed over the past week. Premiership official Graham Poll was at
the centre of huge controversy when he mistakenly booked Croatia’s Josip
Simunic three times before sending him off in their highly-charged 2-2 draw
with Australia. He also missed a blatant penalty by Croatia and FIFA said had
the Socceroos not progressed to the last-16 they might have had a case for a
replay.

PORTUGAL SURVIVE STORMY CLASH

Portugal’s second-round encounter with Holland descended into near farce as
Russian referee Valentin Ivanov dished out a record-equalling 16 yellow cards
and set a new World Cup benchmark by sending off four. The tone was set early
on with bookings for late tackles but the fouls continued to come. Portugal
lost Costinha and Deco while Holland were also reduced to nine men when Khalid
Boulahrouz and Giovanni van Bronckhorst were sent off.

FIGO ESCAPES

Despite Ivanov throwing cards around like confetti, Portugal star Luis Figo
certainly got off lightly after head-butting Mark van Bommel. The referee did
not see the incident and only had it brought to his attention by one of his
assistants. Based on what he was told he decided to book Figo and because he
had taken this action FIFA were later unable to impose further punishment.

HEINZE FORTUNATE

Mexico received a rough deal in their stirring last-16 defeat by Argentina
when defender Gabriel Heinze escaped with a booking for bringing down striker
Francisco Fonseca. The Manchester United man miscontrolled a pass from his
goalkeeper as Fonseca charged in. He slid in to regain possession but caught
the Mexican and, as he was the last man, was fortunate not to see red.

By Andy Hampson