FIFA must introduce video referee NOW after decision against England

Call it flogging a dead horse, but the second pair of knockout matches in the 2010 FIFA World Cup have made the need for goal-line technology even more pressing.

There's been plenty of talk this year of play-acting and diving bandied about as the usual (and justified) criticisms of the world game, but two moments in games of huge importance have revealed to the world what it already knew: referees need a lot more help than they're getting.

Not one person can deny Frank Lampard's goal should have levelled the scores between England and Germany.

Trailing at 2-1, having been outplayed for most of the first half, Lampard contrived to equalise for his country with a shot off the cross bar that cannoned back from behind the line, before the referee inexplicably ruled no-goal.

Germany goalkeeper Manuel Neuer has admitted he conned Uruguayan referee Jorge Larrionda into ruling out Frank Lampard’s ghost goal.

The Schalke No 1 claimed the ball was around two metres over the line while German legend and former coach Jurgen Klinsmann branded the referee’s blunder a ‘disgrace’.

Neuer said: ‘I tried not to react to the referee and just concentrate on what was happening. I realised it was over the line and I think the way I carried on so quickly fooled the referee into thinking it was not over.'