Should FIFA Adopt Instant Replay?

One controversial no-call and 120 minutes of soccer later, France emerged victorious in their World Cup Playoff versus Ireland. The French, who advanced to their fourth consecutive World Cup on a 2-1 aggregate score, needed extra time to punch their ticket to South Africa yesterday evening.

In the midst of the French celebration, the Irish bench looked on with disgust. They felt cheated with the result, and rightfully so. French captain Thierry Henry's obvious handball was either unseen or ignored by the match officials, allowing the forward to flick the ball to William Gallas who tied the game up in the 104th minute.




Henry's handball, and the no-call that followed, overshadowed a hard-fought tie by both sides. The Irish, heavy underdogs going into the playoff, were led by inspirational performances from people like forward Robbie Keane. Keane scored in the 33rd minute yesterday to level the teams on aggregate.

After protests from the Irish, Swedish referee Martin Hansson allowed the goal and took the fight right out of Ireland. It's a shame that the final spot in the World Cup had to come down to human error.

This brings up a great question: should there be instant replay in soccer? Currently there is no such movement to bring replay into the sport, but incidents like this, where the stakes are immense, lead one to believe that the correct ruling should be made even if it means taking it out of the hands of the referees and interrupting play. In America, all major professional sports except Major League Soccer use instant replay. When will soccer catch up to the times?

The Football Association of Ireland today announced its plan to protest the result and ask FIFA for a replay of the contest. Good luck with that. Ireland manager Giovanni Trapattoni called the idea of a replay "impossible."

The Irish were looking to World Cup qualification as a welcome distraction from the economic problems on the Emerald Isle. Turns out, there will be no happy ending this time around.

Opinions from some Irish fans: