Poll: is video technology the way forward for football? You decide!

During the last week, the debate over the use of video technology to eradicate wrong decisions and injustices in football has reached fever pitch.

It is clear that something needs to be done to ensure that incidents such as last week's between France and Ireland are not allowed to happen again. Fifa have called crisis talks following the incident and will surely discuss the issue of the use of technology during this much-needed get-together. UEFA president Michel Platini favours the use of an extra official behind each goal to help make goal-related decisions, and there are many who believe this will be rolled out across the board following a trial period in this year's Europa League.

What do you think is the answer to this debate? Should video replay technology be introduced for the World Cup in 2010, or would Platini's suggestion be more effective? Is there some other form of technology that would be more accurate, such as the use of a modified Hawk-eye system?

Leave your vote in the box to the right of this post, and ener the debate by leaving a comment below.

Wayne Rooney's Street Striker Videos

For the video of the final of Wayne Rooney's Street Striker:

Part 1
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Part 5

Lennon and Defoe make Capello's job easier

Jermain Defoe and Aaron Lennon moved yesterday to end the debate over two of England's so-called "up-for-grabs" places for the final squad to take to South Africa.

Of course, this was only one performance against a Wigan side so woeful on the day that you wondered quite how they could beat anyone in this league, let alone Chelsea as they did just a few weeks ago. Of course, there is a long season ahead and plenty of opportunities for other players to impress, as well as chances for Lennon and Defoe to fall down the pecking order.

However, this display by the pair was so emphatic that I doubt it will be surpassed by any of the other England hopefuls this season. Lennon notched up a goal and three superb assists, and appeared to silence the critics who have slammed his ability to deliver accurate crosses, while Defoe went some way to burying the debate over who is England's best goal-poacher with a stunning display of his finishing talents.

Whatever Mr Capello's thoughts on the matter, it is clear that Lennon and Defoe have thrown down the gauntlet to their challengers, and the likes of Walcott, Wright-Phillips and Milner, and Owen, Bent and Agbonlahor will be hard pushed to make a more convincing case than the diminutive Spurs duo forwarded at White Hart Lane yesterday. This was the kind of football that gets people off their seats, the kind of football that is a credit to the game, and the kind of football that fans will want to see of England next summer.

English snobbery drives our failures

Simon Barnes sums up so much of what is wrong with English sports in today's Times. In a weekend that saw the former champions of the world in rugby suffer their second embarrassing loss in three games Barnes goes for the jugular in this article.

While it is not directly related to football, his insights transcend rugby and are applicable across all sports in England.

Take a read here

The quote below, in my opinion sums up so much of what is wrong with British football. Why are ex-players deemed to be capable managers? Why was Roy Keane deemed to be an appropriate person to lead the multi-million pound organization that was Sunderland? Why was Alan Shearer thought to be that person too? Nowhere else in the world in business are people treated this way except in football.

Martin Johnson was a great rugby player, a wonderful on-the-pitch leader. So the English authorities assumed he would be a great coach and made him team manager. It is another part of English culture, we assume coaching is just an aspect of the magic of leadership. We don’t accept that it is a skill, something you acquire, something you get better at.

Look at the most successful managers in the Premier League: Ferguson, Benitez, Ancelotti and Wenger. The one thing they have in common? All are vastly experienced. When will clubs wise up and realise that experience trumps everything else? How are the England football team doing? Who is in charge I hear you ask. A man of vast experience? Yup.

Hopefully the RFU will realise that this morning and do something about Martin Johnson.

Henry's Call for Replay is Hollow Gesture

The Times is reporting this afternoon that Thierry Henry has called upon Fifa to order a replay of France's World Cup play-off second leg with Ireland.

Henry appears to be attempting to rebuild his reputation that has been left in tatters following his extra-time handball on Wednesday night , but my feeling is that the statement he has made is nothing more than that. Henry doesn't believe Fifa will order a replay. In fact, he's waited until Fifa have actually ruled out the possibility of a replay before making this statememt. To me it seems like a calculated gesture designed to repair significant damage to the reputation of a player who has been obsessed with self-image for the whole of his career.

I'd really rather Henry stayed out of our faces for the foreseeable future, as the only way he is really going to recover from this is by doing his talking on the pitch by balancing his exhilirating style of play with a hefty measure of honesty and integrity. It might be harder than trying to talk his way out of it, but it's the only way back now.

Did UEFA and FIFA miss something?

Take a look at uefa.com, find the match report from last night's game between France and Ireland, take a read, anything seem strange?

Here is how UEFA reported William Gallas' goal:

And so came extra time where in the eighth minute a hopeful France free-kick found its way to Henry, who squared for Gallas to head the goal that takes his country to South Africa.

Hmmmm.......

Well that surely must have been an oversight, surely FIFA - the world governing body wouldn't have missed the same thing would they?

Les Bleus came into the contest after the break but remained vulnerable to Irish attacks, meaning the tie had to be resolved in extra time, when William Gallas equalised to send his team through to their fourth consecutive finals.

Interesting......

What are we to make of this? Regardless of intent or the characters involved what occurred last night was an injustice, and a significant one at that. The World Cup is the self-proclaimed biggest show on earth and for any player probably the pinnacle of their career. To deny a nation the opportunity to compete because of this kind of error is nothing short of a travesty.

The response of FIFA and UEFA? Apparently it never happened. Presumably they hope that everyone on the planet gets their football news through uefa.com and fifa.com and they are looking for complete ignorance of the issue?

So will FIFA or UEFA make a statement about this? Will they do ANYTHING? Well when your leader is Sepp Blatter, reality is not often something that you have to deal with, so I am going to stick my neck out here and say.....no.

Nowhere to hide for cheat Henry

Tonight witnessed one of the great footballing injustices as Thierry Henry's blatant double-handball in Paris gave France an aggregate World Cup play-off victory against Ireland.

Let me set my stall out from the off: there is no situation where cheating in order to gain advantage for your team is acceptable. Doubtless there will be those who, while not condoning Henry's actions, will accept it as part of the game. However, the notion that he did what he did because he had to, and any of us would have done the same is a total fallacy.

There is no excuse for Henry's actions. Some may say that it was an instinctive action, that his arm automatically stretched out to keep the ball in play and as such he is not responsible for those actions. Let me dispel this myth. Handling in order to keep the ball in play is not an instinctive reaction for a footballer. If it was, we'd see it week in, week out in domestic football, but we simply don't. Henry's actions may have played out in a split second, but as a footballer you need less than that time to decide to do something, and Henry clearly made a decision tonight.

Of course this incident will also raise familiar discussions surrounding officials and video replays. That however, is a debate for another day. Tonight there is nothing but a sense of pure injustice on behalf of the Irish who fought so hard and so well, and deserved so much more than to be eliminated by the actions of a cheat.

Craig Burley on point

Today Craig Burley, a man who when he speaks I usually find myself thinking of how on earth this guy made it onto television with as much regularity as he seems to, actually spoke some sense.

While he may be related to George Burley, and has represented Scotland many times before I was glad that he came out with some strong criticism of the Scotland players. George Burley has won close to 300 games a manager and has a win percentage comparable with many of the top Premier League managers so he clearly has a strong pedigree and did not just become a bad manager.

True that sometimes some situations just plain and simple do not work out, but as Craig Burley suggests this is one situation where the blame has to be laid at the door of the Scotland players. One player with a phenomenal scoring record refused to represent his country. Two other players got themselves banned for behaviour not in line with what Burley and the SFA consider appropriate conduct. Burley should be credited for standing up and backing his beliefs and convictions through this debacle. So often in football (and professional sports) doing what "is right" is rarely the key driver in any decision (just look at The FA's behavior towards Jack Warner for evidence of this). I am sure that Burley will manage again, and that he will be successful again.

So what's next for Scotland?

Walter Smith seems to be the only logical choice as it seems he will leave Rangers at the end of year (if not sooner) anyway. He has already walked out on the team once, but that certainly should not preclude him for being considered as the first choice option in what we can presume to be a fairly weak candidate pool.

Breaking News: England B Won't Win World Cup

England's friendly defeat to Brazil on Saturday in Doha really proved nothing more than we already knew: that England's B team aren't good enough to win a World Cup, and that the expectations of the English public become distorted beyond reasonable levels in the run-up to any major tournament.

This starting XI was nothing like the side that England will line up with for their first match of the finals in South Africa - in fact only one player from that team will be guaranteed to start if fit. However, the prevailing mood of the British public in the wake of this narrow defeat is almost inevitably one of gloomy pessimism at our chances next summer.

Let's face it, England's reserve players are not really fit to lace the boots of the first-choicers, but as Patrick Barclay suggests in The Times this morning, is this really much of a surprise?

Maybe it would be better if we all harked back to the days of good ol' Sven, when no-one actually cared about the outcome of such meaningless friendlies.

Dismissal of Gartside's proposals exposes short-sighted leadership

Click here to read about Phil Gartside's proposals for a revamp of the structure of the Premier League

It appears as though Bolton chairman Phil Gartside’s proposals for an overhaul of the structure of the Premier League have been dismissed by those who attended last week’s league meeting. This news comes as no surprise, and in truth Gartside’s proposals appeared half-baked and somewhat apologetic of the need to re-structure the so-called “greatest league in the world”.

That the plans have received such a frosty reception however, suggests cause for concern. Much of the power base of football – the men in high places – acknowledge that something needs to change in our game, yet even the most tentative of proposed plans are dismissed out of hand. I’m not suggesting that Gartside’s proposals should have been embraced and adopted by the league, but the nature of the reception is worrying.

This response does little to dispel the notion that football is clouded by an “everything’s ok” attitude, and that we can go on as we are indefinitely. I’m not sure why, as to me it seems that radical changes need to occur to drag football, and the Premier League into the 21^st century. The much debated issue of club ownership and spiralling football debts aside, I see a league that fundamentally needs a radical structural reorganisation.

For all the posturing of Sky TV, and their ruthless promotion of the Premier League as the most intense, dramatic and edge-of-the-seat theatre available to the armchair consumer, the reality is that the majority of Premier League fixtures really offer very little to get excited about. At least half of the teams in the league fight for nothing more than survival, while another five or six contend for the scraps left by the “top-four”. Added to that, the fixture list is jam-packed with woeful mismatches and unappealing fixtures. A glance at the next round of league games offers the delights of Chelsea v Wolves and Bolton v Blackburn – one an embarrassing mismatch and the other a fierce Lancashire derby for the title of “least bad” team in the league.

Of course the Premier League can offer up excitement and drama and intrigue (thank you, referees), but the reality is that the current formula could be vastly improved upon. The games leaders however – and many of the fans who are happy to see things continue as they are – appear to be doing the game a disservice. Perhaps it is the old English assumption that “we invented the game”, and therefore it must be perfect as it is, that is holding the tide of footballing change back, but something needs to be done to open their eyes. I only hope it’s not too late by the time they realise.

The greatest hat-trick of all time?

Is this hat-trick by Barcelona's Rivaldo the greatest ever scored? Discuss below!