After referee’s farce in Armenia the national coach Luybomir Penev was the only man daring to say that irrespective of how many goals Bulgaria could have scored, the country would still not be allowed to play a barrage. And while he rhetorically asked the world football association (FIFA) if Bulgaria should have come to Yerevan with 3 players less, so as not to confuse their preliminary calculations, the president of the Bulgarian Football Union, Borislav Mihaylov, again hid somewhere in the delegation. Mihailov half-heartedly said that judges are part of the game and they can get it wrong not only when Bulgaria plays but also in other matches. Actually Mihailov tried to avoid the responsibility for another failure of the national team yet at the stage of the qualifications. However, this time the problem is not in the Bulgarian team. As a responsible manager of Bulgaria’s football association Mr. Mihailov had to say out loud that the Bulgarian team was consistently disadvantaged in the EU qualifications by the referees. Even more striking is that some of these people, such as German Felix Brych are one of the top referees and it is difficult to accept that their gaps happened just at random.
After Turkish referee Firat Aydinus
ritually severed the head
of Bulgarian making up a penalty for Denmark, Mr. Penev exploded in Copenhagen saying that yet at the middle of the qualifications, Bulgaria has lost unfairly 4-5 points. Subsequently what appeared in the media implies that this may be a revenge of the grey cardinal in the UEFA Refereeing Commission – Hugh Dallas. The background: in April 2011 the Scottish referee arrived to have talks with Mihaylov to become supervisor of Bulgarian judges against a decent salary. To meet with the president of Bulgaria’s football headquarters, Dallas refused a lucrative referee observing job – the semifinals of the Champions League between Real and Barcelona. Mikhailov, however at the last minute backed out of the deal. Dallas, in turn, who is considered to be the mentor of the judges from Israel and Turkey, is said to have sent Aydinus to do the job in Copenhagen. The Scot was allegedly not afraid of Mihailov as the BFU president is no longer a factor in the UEFA Refereeing Commission but is responsible for the beach soccer. If this story is 100% true is not clear, but the football union never came out with an
official statement to disperse the doubts.
Meanwhile, the judges continued to employ a double standard at Bulgarian matches until the end of the qualifying period. Brych, who was under investigation for tax fraud in his home country, left Armenians to kick like horses their opponents, but at almost every kick of the tri-coloured he pulled a card out of his pocket. On the verge of the norm, diplomatically and punctually (but only for Bulgaria) the top referee pushed the team to the brink of craziness.
Another issue is that Bulgaria’s dream to play in the World Cup was destroyed in advance due to
foolish regulations
for participation at the finals, born from the geniuses at FIFA . The wording weakest second team in Europe is crying for a lawsuit for lost profits. While Bulgaria, the Czech Republic, Denmark and Armenia fought tooth and nail for second place, the six teams from North America freely got three quotas for direct ranking and one of the barrage. Thus, in Brazil the giants Costa Rica and Honduras will play, and they are team highly unlikely to take more than 4-5 points in the group where Bulgaria fought and probably will remain without a single point at the Championship in South America. The fourth one, Mexico will receive for a gift the team of New Zealand for direct elimination. And this happens because of the European Sepp Blatter, who unscrupulously robed one quota from Europe after the World Cup in Germany in 2006.
The BANKER
