After Argentina secured what could have been a thrilling 2-2 draw in the 106th minute of stoppage time, chaos erupted in Saint-Etienne as fans invaded the pitch in protest at the goal, which came after 15 minutes of stoppage time added by Swedish referee Glenn Nyberg.
About twenty Moroccan fans stormed the pitch, and bottles and cups were thrown, forcing the referee to ask the players to return to the locker rooms quickly so that they would not be harmed.
After the match was stopped for about two hours, the players of the two teams returned to the field, and the referee decided, after returning to the video assistant referee (VAR) technology, to cancel Argentina’s second goal due to offside and ordered the remaining three minutes of the match to be completed without fans in attendance, which led many to believe that it took a long time to reach a decision regarding the cancellation of Argentina’s goal.
But in reality, the Argentina goal could have been examined and a decision made immediately thanks to the semi-automated offside technology used in football at the Paris Olympics, and the decision was delayed due to fears of further crowd trouble.
An ESPN report revealed that the organizers were certain that the goal was illegal when chaos prevailed in the stadium, and that issuing any decisive decision would have worsened the situation and may have made things more difficult for the stadium staff.
Semi-automated offside technology used to disallow Argentina goal
The 15 minutes of added time seems excessive at first glance, but in the 110 minutes and 29 seconds the match lasted, ESPN found that the ball was in play for less than half that time — 54 minutes and 27 seconds.
The second half in particular, which lasted 65 minutes, saw only 26 minutes and five seconds of play.
Source: Daily Mail + “ESPN”
#referee #hours #cancel #Argentinas #goal #Morocco #presence #semiautomatic #offside #technology
2024-07-25 15:50:30
