England could be the first team to win a football trophy fair and square after Euro 2024 bosses introduced a robot ball designed to wipe out Hand Of God-style cheating.
All match balls at the tournament – which kicks off when hosts Germany play Scotland – have been fitted with motion-sensing microchips which can track every touch at the rate of 500 times a second.
The artificial intelligence is sensitive enough to determine beyond doubt if a ball brushed a hand in the penalty area or whether a player strayed offside the moment it was kicked.
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The technology – borrowed from cricket’s ‘Snickometer’ – will end any possibility of a repeat of late Argentina star Diego Maradona’s notorious punched goal that helped dump the Three Lions out of the 1986 World Cup quarter-final.
Footballers said the ‘connected ball technology’ will cut out future cheating – making this tournament the fairest ever. It was introduced to cricket in the 1990s, allowing viewers to analyse the sound and video of replays to determine whether the ball had struck the bat.
The tech detects sound frequencies and helps to determine whether two objects have come into contact with one another.
In 2022 Cristiano Ronaldo claimed to have opened the scoring for Portugal in their 2-0 win over Uruguay at the World Cup. The veteran striker insisted he made contact with Bruno Fernandes’ cross but replays proved inconclusive. A day later World Cup organiser FIFA confirmed the goal was not Ronaldo’s by using technology inside the ball.
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Now for the first time TV audiences will be able to view a heartbeat-style soccer snickometer graphic showing whether or not players touched the ball in key moments.
It is part of a transparency drive by UEFA to help reduce fan frustration with Video Assistant Referee calls. In another new development, giant screens inside stadia will offer technical explanations of VAR calls fleshing out why they were made.
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Those will also be made available to TV broadcasters. Roberto Rosetti, UEFA’s chief refereeing officer who took charge of the Euro 2008 final between Spain and Germany, said: “We have the best technology available.”
He said during the tournament referees and captains will be invited to engage in clear dialogue around key decisions. Refs will be able to explain the reasons for VAR rulings to captains or other nominated players if the skipper is a goalkeeper.
The captain will be expected to ask his teammates to keep their distance from the ref and not surround him and yellow cards will be given to players who transgress. Fourth officials will offer explanations to the managers.
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“We are doing this for football,” said Rosetti, who has explained the change to all 24 teams.
“For the image of the game, for the next generation of young players and referees, for the image of football.”
Ref Ali Bin Nasser – who missed Maradona’s handball goal – has insisted he did a ‘good job’ and claimed FIFA ranked him 9.4 out of 10 for his performance.
Nearly four decades on the ref admitted he had ‘doubts’ because ‘something just didn’t feel right about it’ – but blamed his linesman Bogdan Dochev for what he has now acknowledged was a ‘mistake’.
“Diego scored but, immediately after the goal went in, I had my doubts. Something just didn’t feel right about it,” Nasser told FourFourTwo magazine.
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“I had my doubts but my colleague was much better placed than me. Our instructions were clear – if an assistant was in a better position, you had to trust his judgement.”
Before his death aged 80 in 2017, Bulgarian Dochev admitted he saw the handball but did not flag it because Nasser had told him not to make any big decisions during the game.
The linesman struggled to cope with his notoriety and scrawled ‘Maradona is my gravedigger’ on a picture of the star, who died aged 60 two years ago.
Former England captain Terry Butcher, 65, said he had never forgiven Maradona, who afterwards admitted he had been helped ‘a little with the hand of God’.
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