article_snippet.sent: yet it remains one of the unseen by-laws of the game: until such time as an almighty mess is sitting squarely on FIFA’s front step, the governing body chooses to keep the door bolted firmly shut.
article_snippet.sent: Rows over goal-line technology were hardly something new when Frank Lampard’s infamous
article_snippet.sent: ‘ghost’ goal against Germany in the 2010 World Cup finally brought matters to a head.
article_snippet.sent: Scottish Cup had already been scarred by a similar howler while the world watched agog five years later as a Pedro Mendez effort which crossed the line at Old Trafford was incredibly missed by all the officials despite keeper Roy Carroll ending up tangled in the rigging.
article_snippet.sent: Such was the hullabaloo over the incident involving the Portuguese star that FIFA did, in fact, begrudgingly make some noises about trialling goal-line systems but it was no more than platitudes to appease the masses.
article_snippet.sent: it took Frank Lampard’s ruled-out effort in Bloemfontein – with the ball being clearly a yard over Manuel Neuer’s line in the last-16 match – for the dam to finally burst.
article_snippet.sent: Despite initially shrugging off calls for the adoption of goal-line technology to be approved, FIFA relented two years later with the system fully operational last year in Brazil.
article_snippet.sent: The lesson for Scottish football fans still bemused by events at Hampden Park on Sunday when the officials failed to spot a potentially game-changing handball?
article_snippet.sent: Perhaps only when such an outrage occurs in the World Cup in Russia in three years’ time will common sense prevail.
article_snippet.sent: In February, the International Football Board – the SFA, FA, Irish FA, Welsh FA and FIFA – gathered in Belfast supposedly to discuss the possibility of approving trials.
article_snippet.sent: Despite cases also being forwarded by the SFA and Irish FA to at least take the matter further, FIFA, aided by a sceptical Welsh representative, simply kicked the matter into the long grass.
article_snippet.sent: It’s a question of making the biggest decision ever in the way football is played,’ said FIFA’s secretary general Jerome Valcke by way of an explanation for FIFA rejection afterwards.
article_snippet.sent: Yet, until such time as one directly affects the outcome of a the Scottish Cup match involving one of the game’s heavyweights, a World Cup match involving one of the game’s heavyweights seem set to remain an ugly, unsatisfying feature of the landscape.
article_snippet.sent: To the great embarrassment of Michel Platini, the stationing of additional officials behind both goals has proved to be an extraordinary waste of time.
article_snippet.sent: Seemingly less reluctant to get involved than traditional linesman,
article_snippet.sent: ‘additional assistant referees’ - to give them them Sunday names - have seemed utterly superfluous since them were first trialled in the 2009-10 Europa League.
article_snippet.sent: It took the high-profile blunder that denied Frank Lampard in 2010 to shift FIFA on goal-line tecnhology .
article_snippet.sent: Lampard's disallowed goal forced FIFA to rethink, and Scottish fans must hope for a similar incident .
article_snippet.sent: While the video review is normally conclusive, the snag – which is clearly a red flag for FIFA – is the time delay.
highlights_snippet.sent: Additional officials behind goals has proved an extraordinary waste of time .
  
highlights_snippet.sent: But FIFA will require a higher profile blunder to change FIFA laws .