Geoff Hurst, the Hand of God and the Biggest Rows in World Football. Graham Poll

       INTRODUCTION

      On 22 June 2006, in the World Cup in Germany, I showed the yellow card to an Australian-born player twice but did not send him off.

      in the World Cup in Germany, another referee showed his yellow card twice to an Australian player and did not realize. It was the same mistake, in astonishingly similar circumstances, precisely 32 years earlier—but what happened next was very different.

      In my match, Australia versus Croatia in Stuttgart, I showed Josep Simunic two yellows but later sent him off, belatedly, after brandishing a third yellow at him. Hardly a day goes by, still, without my having to hear people making what they think is a joke about it.

      In the 1974 game, Australia versus Chile in Berlin, the referee was Jafar Namdar, from Iran. He cautioned Australia’s Ray Richards in the first half and then, six minutes from the end of the game, booked Richards again for time-wasting. Namdar did not get his red card out. Instead, he trotted away, unaware he had now cautioned Richards twice.

      Up in the stand, the Welsh referee Clive Thomas was watching. He realized the mistake and made it his business to find a FIFA official to point out what had happened. The official hurriedly told another FIFA man, who dashed down to the side of the pitch and informed the nearest linesman. Cue some frantic flag waving. Eventually, although four minutes had passed since referee Namdar had shown the second yellow card to Richards, he showed him the red.

      If only someone—anyone!—had got the message to me 32 years later. If only someone had written a book about World Cup controversies after 1974; perhaps I would have read it, learned, and lived happily every after.

      Now I have written that book. I have looked at ten major controversial incidents from different World Cups. I have examined them from a modern perspective, compared them with very recent controversies in the Premier League, and discovered how the game has changed, how refereeing has changed—and how some things have not altered at all.

      But this is not a refereeing book. It is a football book, because I am passionate about the game and I hope that this book will enable anyone who shares that passion to notice more of what goes on during games. I hope it helps interpret events with a deeper perception. For example, did petty rivalry between the match officials help Diego Maradona get away with the ‘Hand of God’ goal he punched in against England? And why, when I was refereeing, did I sometimes deliberately give a foul for one team or find a reason to book a player from the other team?

      I’ll clear up those and many other mysteries and explode some of the myths of the game as well. Then, the next time the bloke behind you at a match shouts, ‘You don’t know what you’re doing,’ at a ref, you’ll be informed enough to decide whether the spectator is correct!

      So that is what this book is. Now let me tell you what it is not. It is not me saying, ‘I wouldn’t have done that,’ or, ‘I would have done it this way.’ After all, who am I to sit in judgement on World Cup referees after what happened to me? But writing this book, and really scrutinizing