World Cup and Thierry Henry

In all other countries, it's called football. We in America call it soccer. Either way, and despite what some may think about its "lack of appeal", it is the world's most attended sport.

With the draw for the 2010 World Cup less than a day away, a couple of issues that I find very intriguing have transpired.

The first is the issue of French striker Thierry Henry and the other is how the seeds for the eight groups were determined. France might be getting a bad rep and a bad rap.

FIFA's Disciplinary Committee has apparently opened an investigation regarding Henry and his infamous handball incident in a mtach against Ireland.



Henry's play resulted in France scoring the game winning goal and knocking out Ireland. Irelans appealed to FIFA for a rematch. It was denied. Ireland requested to still be included as a 33rd eam. It was also denied.

FIFA's President, Sepp Blatter, acknowledged the investigation.

"The FIFA Disciplinary Committee has opened a case with regard to the behaviour of the French footballer Thierry Henry, and as a result will carry out an investigation as to what happened in that game. I don't know what the outcome of that will be given that it is an issue for the Disciplinary Committee and not the Executive Committee. We should let them get on with their job."

On soccerblog.com, Shourin Roy sheds a diferent light on Henry as a competitor. The picture is the most pleasant. But I do ask a few questions: Is it right to ban Henry for a match due to his "cheating" and past history? Why is FIFA just now moving forward with the "investigation"? Why wasn't one initiated when the incident of the handball occurred?

You could look at the potential changes in officiating, nd Blatter was asked about the possibility of having additional officials and/or the introduction of replay.

"We spoke about what to do with refereeing in future. It's clear that the main match official and his assistants cannot see everything that happens on the field of play. So, is it better to have more match officials or open the door to technology? We will have to evaluate this, though we did take one decision: even if the experiment with two additional match officials in the [UEFA] Europa League continues through to the latter stages (of the competition), there won't be any changes for the 2010 FIFA World Cup. We will continue to use one main match official, two assistants and a fourth official. There's no discussion on this, (the finals) are too soon for us to evaluate other possibilities."

I'll buy that. You would need additional equipment. You would need to have the adequate personnel to work such equipment. You would need to have the equipment positioned correctly in order to monitor the match.

But I feel that France is being equally punished for Henry's play.
Usually, the top eight seeds are detemined by FIFA's November rankings. This time, the October rankings were used. If the November rankings were used, France would have been one of the eight #1 seeds as France was ranked 7th in the world. The top 7 plus the host country get the eight #1 seeds. With the October ranking being used, France missed out as they were ranked 9th.

Why am I whispering "conspiracy" here? Have the rules been changed due to one event of one individual? It sure seems that way.

Politics strike again?

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