Thoughts on Ghana Vs. Uruguay

Today is officially the worst day of the tournament for me.  The only two teams still in it that I was cheering for (Brazil and Ghana) both squandered early leads and got eliminated all within the span of 5 hours.

To make matters worse, Ghana lost in the most heartbreaking (and somewhat controversial) way imaginable.  With the game tied at 1-1 and less than a minute remaining in the second overtime period Ghana had the ball inside the 6-yard box, with a chance to put the game away and avoid the crapshoot of penalty kicks.  The ball bounced around in front of the net a few times, forcing Uruguay's forwards to make timely stops on the goal line at least twice.  Then a final header by Ghanaian substitute striker Attiyah seemed destined for the back of the net, until Uruguay striker, Luis Suarez, while standing on the goal line, intentionally batted the ball away with both hands, averting a certain goal and forcing the Ghanaians to try to seal the deal by converting a penalty kick.

To make a long story short, Gyan blasted the penalty off the crossbar and Ghana went on to lose 4-2 in the penalty shootout.

After reading the comments on a few forums, I feel I need to address some of the misconceptions that seem to be dominating much of the discussion surrounding the Suarez' actions.

1) Most people think Suarez actions were noble since he sacrificed his own tournament to give his team a chance to live on and play another day.

First of all, there was no sacrifice whatsoever.  Without this nefarious intervention, the ball would have gone in for sure and Uruguay's tournament would have been over anyway.  Not only that, but Suarez was actually hoping he wouldn't get caught, in which case there would have been no penalty to him at all.

2) Many of the same people who are praising Suarez as a hero, are saying that his actions can't be compared with Thierry Henry's intentional hand ball that propelled France to qualify for the World Cup at the expense of Ireland.  Most of these people claim Suarez' handball isn't as bad because he was caught and sanctioned appropriately, therefore all is forgiven.

This is bullshit.  If you saw the game, it's clear that Suarez at first tried to get away with it.  He had no intention of confessing that he had cheated.  In fact, right after the handball he appeared to assume a volleyball stance in preparation for having to bat the ball away again.  And when the ref blew the whistle, he wagged his finger as if to say, "I didn't touch it".  So the bottom line is, if you hated Henry for robbing the Irish of their potential victory, you should equally hate Suarez for robbing the Ghanaians of their certain victory.  The only difference is that Suarez got caught whereas Henry didn't.  If you adhere to the double standard, then you’re essentially saying, “It’s only cheating if you don’t get caught.”

3) A lot of people have said that any player in the same circumstance would have done the same thing Suarez did. 

This is more bullshit.  There are ample examples of times where there was a scramble in from of the net, the keeper was beaten and it was left to an outside player to try to stop the goal without using his hands.  If the ball is too high to kick away, in the vast majority of these cases, the defending player will try to head the ball to safety, and most of the time they fail.  I've seen players stop possible goals with their hands, but I have NEVER seen a player use his hands like that on the goal line to stop what would otherwise be a guaranteed goal.  There's no question that many players will either use their hands or foul to stop a guaranteed goal if the game is on the line, but to say that everybody would have done this, or even to suggest that the majority would have done this is simply not supported by the evidence.

4) The biggest point of contention in the forums is, what should the appropriate sanction be?  Comparisons have been made to football, where, in the event of pass interference in the end zone, the offensive team is given the ball on the 1 yard line (or is it half the distance to the goal.  I can't remember right now).  Either way, the point is that you never award an automatic score, therefore Ghana should not have been awarded an automatic goal.

This comparison breaks down for two reasons:

i) Unlike in Ghana's case, when a receiver is interfered with, it doesn't mean he was denied a guaranteed touchdown.  The receiver still has to catch the ball, which is only about a 70-80% proposition even if he's open.

ii) Pass interference subjective.  There is usually some contact between the receive and the defensive back so it would be too dangerous to give the ref's the power to arbitrarily grant automatic touchdowns in these situations.

In the case of Ghana, the goal was GUARANTEED, as in BEYOND ANY REASONABLE DOUBT.  And the handball was explicit and intentional.  There was no grey area.  The best comparison in my view, is the basketball comparison.  If you jump in the air and block an opposing player's shot after it's on the way down then the basket counts.  As long as there was a reasonable chance of the ball going in, you can't cheat to stop a player from scoring.  You just can't do it.

Given the way the rules are, it's really hard to blame anybody.  The referee did all he could under the circumstances.  Ghana had two chances to recover from the handball and win the game anyway, and they squandered both.  In my opinion, Suarez is a bitch with no honour.  But that's how soccer is.  Players are always trying to use any advantage they can get, even if it means breaking the rules. ('hand of god' anyone?).

All in all, it was just an unfortunate sequence of events.  But if there is such a thing as karma, then Uruguay will get routed buy Holland in the semis for their cheating ways.  And Holland will get routed by Argentina in the finals for the Boer Colonization of South Africa.

We'll see what happens.