How far will they go?

Now that we know the names of all but a few of the teams that are going to South Africa year, it would be interesting to know just how far they are prepared to go to win the competition. Will they give their all? Will they put their bodies on the line?

Will they cheat?

Whenever there is controversy in the World Cup, it always seems to surround the eventual winners, or at least the finalists:

1930 Uruguay-Argentina
In the first round Argentina kicked France to defeat with the referee’s blessing and then benefitted from more help from the referee against Mexico. In the semi-final Yugoslavia had a goal wrongly disallowed against the hosts at 2-1 down.

1954 West Germany-Hungary
In the first round Germany fielded a reserve side against Hungary in order to take advantage of the rules in operation at the time and play Turkey again and in the final there was a foul on the Hungarian keeper in Germany’s second goal and Hungary’s perfectly legitimate third goal was disallowed. Then of course there was the added advantage of Germany’s new boots – there was far less in the rule books about equipment then, so any changes were not available to all the competitors – and the controversy of the injections given to the German players has never been resolved either.

1966 England-West Germany
In the first round World Champions Brazil were eliminated by the English referees – this was the team that had won the previous two World Cups and would win the next one. In one quarter-final another superior South American team, Uruguay, was eliminated thanks to a phantom German goal, two red cards and of course an English referee. In another of the quarter-finals the German referee sent the Argentine captain off because he “didn’t like the way he had looked at him”. The semi-final venue was abruptly changed from Anfield to Wembley after England’s quarter-final victory to give the hosts a better chance of winning. And of course England won the final on the strength of another phantom goal.

1974 West Germany-Holland
There was more suspect English refereeing in the final, but by then both teams were there. Whether the better team won or not, however, is still open to debate.

1978 Argentina-Holland
In the second round a Peru team with an Argentine keeper, Ramón Quiroga, collapsed against their Argentine hosts, who needed four goals and were given six.

1982 Italy-West Germany
In the first round Cameroon had a legitimate goal disallowed and Italy went through on the strength of that goal, while Austria and Germany engineered a result with such bare-faced cheek that the fans booed their teams for the best part of ninety minutes.

1986 Argentina-West Germany
The Hand of God. Although the other goal...

1994 Brazil-Italy
In the quarter-final between Italy and Spain, with the Italians winning 2-1, Mauro Tassotti elbowed Luis Enrique in the face so hard that the Spaniard lost a pint of blood from his broken nose, FIFA banned the offender for eight matches and the Italian never played for Italy again. However, the referee gave no red card, no penalty and Italy went through.

1998 France-Brazil
In the first round Italy qualified top of the group through a highly controversial penalty against Chile, but fortunately their usual antics did not help them reach the final.

2002 Brazil-Germany
In the quarter-final the US were denied a penalty – and the Germans escaped a red card – after Germany’s Frings handled on the line with the score at 1-0.

2006 Italy-France
In the first round de Rossi was banned for 4 games for elbowing a US player; the US team was also denied a legal goal. In the next round the referee gave Italy as long as necessary to score against Australia (with the game locked at 0-0) then gifted them a penalty in the 95th minute. In the final France were denied a penalty in the 53rd minute at 1-1, and the rest is indeed history.

I’m writing this now in the hope that I can reach next summer’s tournament with the usual excitement and optimism. However, I fear that by the end of the month’s football I’ll be left feeling disgusted and betrayed when the usual suspects cheat their way to victory.