What an exciting, controversial second half of football that was in the Croatia v Portugal game. Notice I said second half as the first half had me nodding off and was as about exciting as one of Danny Murphy's stories about his flipping cat called Bob. This second period had everything. There were 3 disallowed goals, a very soft penalty, a Ronaldo goal and probably the biggest VAR decision of this entire tournament, and I haven't even mentioned Bob Martins growing some bollocks and subbing Ronaldo off, which basically meant that Portugal won the game. It really was an eventful second 45, although by the time it finished it was nearly an hour.
There is only one place to start and that is of course at the very end and the reason that Croatia's last gasp equaliser was ruled out because of offside. I have watched this incident back many, many times now and no matter how many times I watch it, I am not having that the ball touches the Croatian attacker before it hits the defender and arrives at the feet of another Croatian attacker who crosses the ball and Croatia score. Just to be clear I do know the rules of offside and I am aware that if the ball has touched the first attacker then the second attacker is offside despite if it gets deflected accidentally by a Portuguese defender in to his path then it is offside, but watching with my own eyeballs the first attacker doesn't touch it. We were then told that because there is a chip in the ball now and the technology that cannot be wrong, because it has been checked so vigorously before the tournament and it is so perfect that it is impossible for it to be wrong, well it can be wrong cos it is!! They then went on to show some snicko thing like a real shit version of the one in cricket, firstly you can't determine from what they show you when the spike actually happens and exactly when contact is made, it looks like the ball doesn't change direction until it hits a defenders arm before finally hitting another defender on the back before getting to the Croatian attacker. If they went in to detail and showed exactly when the first touch happens like they do in cricket I would say, fair play, that's just bad luck but it seems to me they made up their mind with very little evidence and told us all that what we saw with our own eyes wasn't true. It doesn't matter how many times Darren Cann or Dermot Gallagher tell me that they got to the right decision because of this new technology, I aint having it until I see categoric evidence. How big is that spike, when does it happen what causes the spike, how sensitive is the chip in the ball, could've it have been the wind, could've it been a bead of sweat, could've it been something else, I'm sorry but just cos you say the technology is right and because we say it is, that's the end of it, that aint good enough. In Cricket they roll it back and forward to make sure they know if it hits the bat or the glove or the pad or something else and most times it is correct, this bullshit showed nothing, even when the ref was looking at the replay he was looking at it from one angle from what looked like space, where is the zoomed in angle? where are the other angles that can help him make decision. It seems all wrong to me, but hey I am just a punter who wants to be entertained. I really believe that Croatia have been hard done by here, now don't get me wrong I don't condone the Croatia fans throwing things on the pitch after the decision, although I will say, I am all up for the woman in the crowd caught on camera shouting F you at the ref, even if it wasn't his fault, but that's just because to me they are just a bunch of glorified traffic wardens.
The problem is that this game was robbed of an amazing moment, a last gasp equaliser to send an exhilarating second half into extra time. The scenes in the crowd when the Croatians thought they scored, the jubilation of the players on the pitch, the crestfallen faces of the Portuguese players being so close to victory, all this is then overturned by so much technology which as far as I can see could be wrong. Surely in a situation were it is not clear cut and clear and obvious you go with the original decision, I get that people will say but that would be unfair on Portugal, but I can tell you now if the boot was on the other foot Bob Martins, Ronaldo and all their fans would be reacting the same way. I thought that when VAR came in it would improve football and crackdown on the clear and obvious errors and we were also told that VAR wouldn't be re-refereeing decisions. It appears to me that it may have become too much as football at the highest level is having its heart and soul sucked out of it, no longer is it safe to celebrate a goal, no longer does it feel spontaneous, fun and exciting as it once did. How long will it be before officials are replaced completely and all decisions are made remotely from bods in a studio with an umpire on the pitch just making sure that nobody kills each other, I really feel like this is where football is headed and if this is case we may as well just play FIFA.
I would like to point out as well I am not anti Portugal, granted I think Ronaldo is smug twat but, I would've rather of seen Portugal go through as them playing Spain in the last 16 is more appealing to me than Croatia, no, what I'm sore about is that we were all robbed of a fantastic moment in sport. It does make me laugh though that the first time there is major controversy with VAR it's a Premier League referee sitting in the booth overseeing it. Just a coincidence of course that Jarred Gillett was the man calling the shots.
So after all that it will be Portugal against Spain, Spain barely broke into a sweat as the easily dispatched Austria, who to be honest looked very poor. A brace from my tip for the golden boot Mikel Oyarzabal and one from Tottenham defender Pedro Porro saw the Spaniards sail into the last 16. The showdown with Portugal is going to be unmissable, as you would imagine there will be no love lost between the two. Spain will rightly start as big favourites as the begin to look ready to take on all comers in their quest to win back to back major tournaments.
In the other game it was a pretty standard win for Switzerland over a team in Algeria who looked out of the depth in the knockout stages of the tournament, Switzerland probably haven't had and are very unlikely to have an easier game than this one, but you can only beat what is in front of you and that is just what they did. The Swiss will now play either Colombia or Ghana who finish off the round of 32 in the early hours of Saturday morning, Friday night sees Australia take on Egypt and Argentina try and break down Cape Verde, surely the minnows cant take Messi and Co all the way to penalties and knock them out, can they? Probably not because VAR will jump in rule that the Cape Verde keeper's nose hair was deemed to have come off the line meaning his save from Lionel Messi to win the game didn't count and would have to be retaken.
Enjoy the football!!
