Video ref not on agenda – Blatter

Fifa President Sepp Blatter has apologised to the football federations of England and Mexico after the weekend World Cup injustices – but insisted that video technology is still not on the agenda.

Speaking at a press briefing in South Africa on Tuesday morning, Blatter reflected on the errors which saw England denied a clear goal against Germany and Argentina’s opening goal against Mexico allowed despite clear video replays showing that Carlos Tevez was clearly offside.

Blatter, who apologised to the Football Association of Ireland following the controversial Thierry Henry handball in Paris in November, has spoken with representatives of the respective associations.

He said, “Personally I deplore it when you see evident referee mistakes but it’s not the end of a competition or the end of football, this can happen.

“The only thing I can do is on Monday I have spoken to the two federations (England and Mexico) directly concerned by referee’s mistakes. I have expressed to them apologies and I understand they are not happy and that people are criticising.

“I apologised to England and Mexico. The English said ‘thank you’ and accepted that you can win and you lose, and the Mexicans bowed their head and accepted it.”

However, the Swiss added that the use of video evidence, which has been a great success in sports such as rugby, cricket and American football, is still not on the agenda.

“The only principle we are going to bring back for discussion is goal-line technology,” he said.

“Football is a game that never stops and the moment there was a discussion if the ball was in or out, or there was a goal-scoring opportunity, do we give a possibility to a team to call for replays once or twice like in tennis?

“For situations like the Mexico game you don’t need technology. It’s obvious that after what we have experienced so far it would be a nonsense not to reopen the technology topic in July in Cardiff.”