Why UEFA’s Extra Officials Experiment Isn’t Working

In Wednesday’s round of Champions League matches, AC Milan vs. Barcelona was a match that stood out.  In a match that could decide the winner of Group H, most people expected it to be entertaining.  It certainly delivered, with Barcelona winning 3-2, and leading three times.  After a Mark van Bommel own goal gave Barcelona the lead in the 14^th minute, Zlatan Ibrahimovic equalised six minutes later.

Around the half hour mark, Xavi broke into the penalty area, attempting to get onto the end of a Cesc Fabregas pass.  He was fouled by Alberto Aquilani and the referee gave Barcelona a penalty.  Aquilani had earlier been booked by the referee, and looked set to be sent off.  But after the Milan protests had died down, the only player booked was Milan’s Alessandro Nesta.  Although the referee could see the foul, he was far enough away to accept that he could have confused Aquilani with Nesta, but the foul occurred just a few feet away from the goal-line official.  The official appeared to do nothing to alert the referee to his mistake, and the match continued.

UEFA introduced the 6^th and 7^th officials to the Europa League in 2009.  After what they believed was a successful trial period, they added the officials to the Champions League last season, and they will also be used at next summer’s European Championships.  But most football fans will question how effective these extra officials actually are.

Last season, when Spurs were playing Young Boys in the second leg of their Champions League qualifier, Jermaine Defoe made the score 2-0 in the 32^nd minute.  Replays showed that he had used his arm to control the ball before going on to score.  The ball had been passed to him through the air, so the referee was behind him.  The linesman, on the opposite side of the pitch had a number of players between him and the incident, but again, the goal-line official had an unobstructed view.  But Defoe’s goal was allowed to stand and Spurs progressed comfortably through to the group stages for the first time.

Whenever you watch a European game this season, you will see little interaction between the goal-line officials and the referees, and they seem uncertain as to what they are actually able to do during a game.  They might get involved if there is an altercation between players before the referee can get there, but in general they seem to stand near to the goals and observe.  One of the main reasons for them being there at all is UEFA’s reluctance to introduce goal-line technology. 

There are any number of infamous ‘non-goals’ in football, balls that crossed the line but weren’t given as goals, and balls that didn’t cross the line but were given as goals.  UEFA’s logic is that an official on the goal-line should have an unobstructed view of these incidents allowing them to definitively say whether or not the whole ball crossed the line.  But the reality is that these incidents normally take a split-second to occur, and it’s only when replays are slowed down and every angle is shown that analysts can decide if the whole ball did or did not cross the line.

To an extent, I can understand UEFA’s reluctance to introduce goal-line technology.  If it was successful, it would inevitably lead to people wanting it introduced for more things, such as offsides and deciding if a foul took place inside or outside the penalty area.  Although most ‘was it over or wasn’t it’ decisions could be in seconds after watching a replay, the game would be slowed down dramatically if it was introduced to decide moments that occur in every game. 

However, if UEFA really want to avoid introducing goal-line technology, they must instruct the goal-line officials to get more involved in decision making.  Although Barcelona went on to beat AC Milan 3-2, had Aquilani been correctly sent off, it would have been a different game.  The goal-line official should have gotten the referee’s attention and told him which player committed the foul.  The sixth and seventh officials were introduced to improve the referee’s ability to manage games.  If UEFA fail to give them more responsibility, it is an experiment that is doomed to fail.

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