Contentious, iffy, ugly... are all some ways to describe goal-line decisions. In or out - sometimes becomes a million-dollar question.
Matches and titles get decided and careers shaped on these split-second decisions. Needless to say, often linesmen and referees tend to get ‘em wrong and knowing football, things can get real nasty real quick.
Footballs fitted with special chips could soon pave the way for a trouble-free match. Having been successfully tested in a match in Japan, these could soon be adopted in Premiership as well.
And here’s how they work: wires are embedded in the pitch near the goalmouth. The magnetic field emitted by these wires can detect the presence of a football with a built-in special sensor. Presence of a sensor means that the ball can be traced anywhere around the pitch. When the ball does cross the line, a signal is sent to referees’ watch to let him know.
These balls had earlier been tested albeit unsuccessfully at the Under-17 World Cup in Peru in 2005. This time around though, Adidas’s Head of FIFA Affairs Gunter Pfau has claimed that the results from the balls at the recently concluded FIFA Club World Cup have been a huge success. Here’s what he said at the press conference at Yokohama International Stadium:
We are very satisfied. No ball was damaged, all the systems during the games worked and the players’ feedback here has been very positive.
There might be some time before we actually see one of these intelligent balls actually being used in a competitive scenario. Till then it is back to goalkeeper’s word on whether the ball did go over. And we all know how honest they are, don’t we?
Via: DailyMail
