Why oh why, Uruguay?

To cry is the lot of all mankind

And the eyes that shine in joyous delight today

Are doomed ere long to brim over,

As the welling tears overflow

And we moan: “Woe is today!

Woe is today!

Woe is today!

I wonder what R M Ballantyne would make of that. I first heard his lines, “To part is the lot of all mankind” from the lips of a good friend – now departed — called Kwame Asiedu Acheampong, at Kyebi Government School. Kwame recited Ballantyne with great feeling, and when he said the words, “When the quivering lips pronounce the word, farewell,” he lowered his voice and made it convey the idea of quivering lips –so much so that one could actually imagine what it would feel like to be saying “farewell” to one’s beloved friends. What an actor Kwame would have been, had the opportunity arisen for him.

He did get the chance to act — very briefly –when I was cast in a classroom play as Pythias to his Damon in an adaptation of The History of Damon and Pythias by Valerius Maximus. Many teachers were erudite men and women then, who sought to initiate their pupils into the delights of great literature: ours was called Kofi Awuah Peasah, from Old Tafo, and I owe almost all my love of English literature to him. To have heard him declaim, “Frailty! Thy name is woman!” would have made one think that William Shakespeare was born on the very banks of the Birem River, and was there, to record the travails of the people of Tafo, when (as they believe) their ancestors emerged from the bottom of the River.

“Woe is today?” Why do I say that?

Did not the whole world see that Ghana had beaten Uruguay and should be the one to advance into the semi-finals of the 2010 World Cup?

Was not excruciating pain inflicted upon the whole of the African continent, when Uruguay’s Luis Suarez used his hands to push back a ball that had entered the Uruguayan goalpost last minute of extra time?

Did not the referee fail to award Ghana the clinching goal?

Red card, penalty — was that what Africa wanted? No! Justice demanded that the goal be awarded so that Ghana would be the winner — the first African country ever to cross the semi-final barrier!

Uruguay cheated. Our missed penalty, heart-breaking as it was, was but a red herring.

Uruguay cheated – and was allowed to benefit from cheating.

No-one on the African continent will ever forget that act of infamy. Especially after they have read these defiant words of the cheat, Luis Suarez:

“The Hand of God now belongs to me”

Suarez said after the match.

“Mine is the real Hand of God,” he repeated. “I made the best save of the tournament. Sometimes in training, I play as a goalkeeper so it was worth it…. When they missed the penalty, I thought ‘It is a miracle and we are alive in the tournament’. Sometimes in training, “I play as a goalkeeper”, Suarez added.

The question is: Does FIFA think it acceptable that a team should field two goalkeepers in a FIFA match?

FIFA’s rules were made by man, and are not immutable. This particularly transparent bit of cheating by Suarez is a warning to FIFA that it is in danger of creating a very bad precedent that will henceforth be followed by a whole population of unscrupulous football player-cynics, who will do everything in their power not to lose a match. Isn’t one Maradona enough in football history? Now. We’ve also got a Suarez! Cheats will be “Suarezing all over the place,” mark my words.

As could be expected, the Internet is awash with analyses of what happened to the Ghana Black Stars on Friday, July 2, 2010.

The writer whose views are most cogently argued is Mr Solomon Amanzulley Akessey of Grinnell College, USA.

He notes that the World Cup in South Africa “has raised a long list of ethical issues against the beautiful game” that “FIFA must address if the game is to remain beautiful.” He thinks the most pressing of these are “deliberate hand ball fouls”, like the one that denied Ghana the chance of qualifying to the Semi-Finale  

“If FIFA refuses to look into this problem, then the message it seeks to send is that cheating, however unethical and immoral, is useful and players can and should cheat to win.

“Uruguay clearly did it (on Friday, July 2, 2010]. Suarez, being the last defender on the line, deliberately arrogated the privileges of the goal-keeper to himself and handled the ball. Had he not handled the ball, it is pretty obvious that (Ghana) would have scored the goal… The rules were clear and the referee played fair and promptly showed him the red card and awarded a penalty to Ghana.

“But therein lay the problem. When a goal has clearly been denied in such an illegal way, it is simply unconscionable for FIFA to try to solve the problem in a way that does not punish the opposing team as they deserve, but rather rewards them.

“If a player is the last man on the line and he handles the ball, when he is not the goal-keeper, then it should be an automatic goal… For if a penalty is awarded, the pressure alone could make the (penalty) taker miss the shot in which case the player who committed the foul would have been justified in committing it. And we saw (that happen) when Suarez started jumping up and down, when Asamoah Gyan missed the penalty.”

This view that an automatic goal be awarded to the team that has been fouled against, has been strongly supported by no less a person than a former World Cup referee from Britain, Mr Graham Poll. Mr Poll wrote in the London Daily Mail :

“FIFA make every player wear a ‘fair play’ badge and yet a cheats’ charter exists which Luis Suarez of Uruguay exploited to help his side reach Tuesday’s World Cup semi-final against Holland.

“Dominic Adiyah’s header was on the way in to give Ghana victory when Suarez deliberately beat the ball out with his hand.

The officials got it spot on, dismissing Suarez and awarding a penalty, but that gave Uruguay a lifeline they did not deserve. The penalty, the final act in extra time, was missed and Uruguay won the subsequent shoot-out. Referee Olegario Benquerenca would have been relieved to spot the handball, but in the dressing room afterwards, his team would have discussed the sense of injustice.

“The clause in law under which Suarez was dismissed was the denial of an obvious goalscoring opportunity. This carries a one-match ban, leaving Suarez free to play in the final should Uruguay beat Holland. The problem is that Ghana were denied a goal not just the opportunity to score one.

A penalty goal in these circumstances would be appropriate.”

If you ask me — and I don’t want to generalise — it is not surprising that it was a Latin American country that cheated Ghana so blatantly. In Latin America, some people take football fanaticism to an almost religious level.

The most notorious incident of what might be called ‘non-football football’ occurred in 1969 in Latin America when, during a series of World Cup qualification matches between El Salvador and Honduras, feelings were aroused to such an extent that riots occurred, followed by an actual “Football War” (known locally as La guerra del fútbol) between the two countries. It lasted for 100 hours or four days, during which 2,000 people were killed.

It was also mainly vagabond trouble in stadiums in Latin America that made it necessary for moats to be built in some stadiums, to prevent the football fans from invading the pitch and trying to lay hands on referees who have angered them. In one instance, a crowd surrounded a referee and tried to strangle him. Some readers will also recall the story of how Andres Escobar, a Colombian player who was shot and killed after an own-goal scored by him had caused Colombia to lose 2-1 to the United States, in a Word Cup match in June 1994.

The world desperately needs protection from those who want to cheat in order to advance in the World Cup. Now that the FIFA president, Mr Sepp Blatter, has accepted the principle of using technology to assist referees in decision-making, all manner of cheating should be eliminated so that the world can enjoy football without any reservations. What is the point of leaving games to be decided by ‘non-offside offsides; goals-not-given when the ball has clearly crossed the line; free-kicks given as a result of play-acting on the field; etcetera etcetera, when 21st technology can help to eliminate all doubts from the minds of referees when they are making decisions?

The most miraculous thing that technology has brought into another game that is often surrounded by controversy, cricket, is to eliminate cheating and doubt about umpire decisions. When the cricket ball hits the edge of a bat so faintly that it is difficult for the umpire to detect whether the ball had touched the bat or not, an infra-red video can now show whether the ball did in fact hit the bat before being caught by the wicket-keeper or another player. Video can also help detect whether a ball that has been caught “carried”, or not – that is, whether it touched the ground before being gathered into the hands of the catcher. Formerly, hundreds of hours — and thousands of words – were expended arguing over such inridente during cricket matches. One of the best bowlers of his time, Michael Holding of the West Indies – so devastating in attack that they nicknamed him “Whispering Death” — was reduced to breaking down and crying on the pitch at Perth when biased umpiring denied him of wicket after wicket during the West Indies tour of Australia in 1975-76.

The introduction of “third umpires” who can use video to adjudicate controversial issues has ensured that such iniquities can never happen again in the game of cricket.

We live in a world that has made incredible advances in technology, which formerly “moribund” games like cricket have been quick to utilise.. But human lack of intelligence is still holding us back and frustrating us with outmoded laws, in some sports, especially football. I am sure that if Mr Blatter, the FIFA president, were to take a walk in the streets of Soweto before he departs for home, he would see fingers being pointed at him and someone saying,

“This is the man whose stupid organisation threw out the last African country from the World Cup, when it was only cheated of victory because there were two goalkeepers playing for its opponent, Uruguay.”

Everyone I gave talked to after the match says simply: “your boys did Africa proud”.

The cheating they suffered will not be in vain, if it galvanises FIFA into action, to eliminate once and for all, such idiocies from the thrilling game of international football.

BY CAMERON DUODU

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