Thierry Daniel Henry’s double hand passing of the ball to French team mate William Éric Gallas, which resulted in that all important extra-time goal, was a cruel and devastating blow to Ireland’s World Cup hopes last night.
While publicly, Henry may claim his double handling of the ball was accidental, the truth remains, he is privately aware that this act in sealing Ireland’s fate last night, was simply blatant cheating.
Giovanni Trapattoni
For all his genius over the past decade, Thierry Henry, must now join a list of sporting greats that will be forever remembered more for that one moment of disgrace, than for the myriad of graceful moments with which he was previously recognized.
It is a shameful day for the game of football when something like this is allowed to happen, in full view of the eyes of the sporting world and the officials of the international governing body of football.
The cowardly, greedy and gutless guardians of the sport themselves must now be called to account. Is not the pursuit of fairness in football a FIFA ideal and is it not high time this governing body stood by their principle of fair play and act now?
Surely, if you’re trying to run the largest sporting event in the world, and the purpose of the event is to find out who is the best football team in the world, then you must ensure, no guarantee, that the officiating of such an event is to a standard which puts the future destiny of each team in the hands of each players ability. The truth would appear however that FIFA wanted Portugal and France to go through on financial grounds and FIFA’s dream has now been fully realised by turning a blind eye to blatant cheating by France.
Video film does not lie, France’s captain had handled the ball, not once, but twice. While the first time might have been forgiven as a pardonable reflex action, the second handling was clearly intentional. Not only was France’s national pride at stake, but also for FIFA was tens of millions of euros.
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