The game of football is loved across the world for its ability to provide adrenaline-pumping thrills and fun to the audience in a short span. The “Beautiful Game” has over the years thrown up several unpredictable and strange moments to spice up the proceedings. So, today we will be touching upon certain strange events in the sport that forced authorities’ interference and setting up of new rules. These moments altered the future course of the game and even in some cases brought disrepute as well. Let us recount three awkward moments in football.
Royalty Livid With Refereeing Gaffe (1982)
In 1982, when Kuwait made their maiden and only appearance at the FIFA World Cup, the Gulf country’s joy knew no bounds. They began their campaign on a good note as they drew level with the first group fixture against the then Czechoslovakia. Then their next encounter happened to be with one of the soccer giants across the globe France and the excitement was palpable among the Kuwaiti citizens. But something untoward happened in the match involving the two teams that affected the reputation of the Beautiful Game.
In the encounter, France was leading Kuwait in terms of goals and the former netted one more time to make the scoreline 3-1, but Kuwait players were unhappy as they heard the referee’s whistle at the time the goal happened. This led to a tense atmosphere on the ground as Kuwait FA President Prince Fahid entered the ground in anger to register his protest at the goal scored by France and asked his players to leave the ground. Eventually, after the flare-up of a sufficient amount of temper, the goal was disallowed. However, the referee was banned from refereeing in future matches and Fahid was fined for breach of discipline. Despite all the drama, Kuwait lost the match 4-1 to France and got eliminated from the World Cup after losing to England in their last group match.
The Shameful Dealing Between Austria & Germany (1982)
In the final group fixture involving West Germany and Austria both the teams knew what to do in order to progress further in the tournament. Algerians had already played their last group game and their advancement in the tournament hinged on Germany’s defeat, a German victory by three goals or more and a draw in the last group encounter. And when the match finally kicked off Germans scored in the 10th minute of the game against Austria.
However, from then on match became farcical as both sides employed some shockingly defensive tactics with the ball being simply passed around casually by players of both the teams for most of the duration, resulting in a German victory (1-0). The result meant qualification for both Germany and Austria to the next stage of the World Cup, ruining the prospects of Algeria in the process. Both the teams received a lot of flak for the disgraceful display but they were not punished as they hardly broke the FIFA rules. Due to this unsavoury episode, every final group game in the international arena was mandated to have a simultaneous kick-off time in future.
How An Own Goal Helped Barbadians? (1994)
Scoring an own goal is considered a cardinal sin in football but in the Caribbean Cup Qualifier of 1994 involving Barbados and Grenada it turned out to be a blessing for the former. This was due to the incorporation of an unusual rule in the tournament in which a draw was not acceptable. The rule stipulated that the first goal in the extra time will be counted as double and would seal the deal in the favour of the team who finds the net for the first time.
The match began with both Barbados and Grenada having bright chances of progressing to the major tournament. Barbados were leading in the game with a 2-0 margin, the two-goal difference was exactly what they needed for victory, and were poised to qualify till Grenada scored one later on. Now, Barbados needed one more goal because as per rules they can only qualify for the major tournament with a victory margin of two goals. However, the time was running out for Barbadians as they had only seven minutes to score the goal that would make all the difference to their fortunes.
When Barbadians found out that it was tough to find the net in the allotted time, they scored an own goal so as to take the game to extra time where in they could score a golden goal to maintain the two-goal deficit. In the extra when the score was tied at 2-2 there were some unusually funny scenes involving Grenada as they tried to score goals at both the posts to deny Barbadians the requisite margin to qualify and the latter was found strangely guarding both the goal posts to thwart former’s designs. Finally, Barbados scored in the extra time which was considered as double as per the rules devised by the organisers and won the game by a 4-2 margin against Grenada. However, Grenada was not at all amused by the strange rules of the tournament and they made no bones about the same after the match.
