After the international hullabaloo that erupted last summer during the World Cup in South Africa, soccer's international governing body is closer than ever to instituting new technology that can instantly detect whether a ball has crossed the goalline during match play.
The UK Guardian reports that as many as 13 companies are in the running to provide FIFA with next-gen tech that can immediately relay to on-field officials that a goal has been scored. These companies will make a formal presentation in Zurich to FIFA brass, which presumably will include its controversial president, Sepp Blatter.
The fervor reached a fever pitch last July when England's Frank Lampard scored what appeared to be an equalizing goal in his country's match against Germany, but FIFA officials did not rule a goal on the play and a firestorm of criticism was immediately unleashed that led to the organization pursuing more technological means in future tournaments.
Conditions of the goalline technology, as reported by the Guardian, will require companies to produce a goal-detection system that can alert refs within a second that a ball has definitively crossed the goalline. It's up to the individual companies as to how exactly they can produce such a firm result, but one company that appears to have a leg up is Goalminder, a UK company about which not much is known but that apparently uses goalpost-mounted HD cameras that deliver high-resolution footage on the fly.
If FIFA does the right thing – and that is always a big "if" – it will move quickly next month to test out all the available tech and announce a recipient of the contract soon thereafter. Otherwise, the controversies of last summer will only simmer longer in the hearts of soccer fans and any attempt to rectify the mistakes of the past will only be that much more difficult.
Photo: Flickr/drb62, CC
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