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☆☆☆ World Cup 2014 Photos ☆☆☆
- Thread starter Ultimate Warrior
- Start date
World Cup 2014 : Seven biggest controversies
Suarez biting
Luis Suarez went one up on the Zinedine Zidane headbutt and Nigel De Jong karate kick, with a gratuitous act of on-pitch violence that we all knew he was capable of.
The whole episode was made the more ridiculous by Suarez’s non-apology apology and the accusations of a global witch hunt orchestrated against him at the behest of the British media.
Suarez's four-month ban from playing all football and even entering a stadium did for once, seem a proportionate punishment for his actions.
Picture: Mario Tama/Getty Images
That Japanese referee
Refereeing controversies have been thankfully absent from most of this year’s competition, something that didn’t look like it would be the case after the opening match.
Japanese official Yuichi Nishimura incurred the wrath of the Croatians after awarding a soft penalty to the hosts, failing to punish a Neymar elbow on Luka Modric with a red card, and disallowing what looked to be a perfectly legitimate Croatian goal. The sight of Neymar shaking the ref’s hand before departing the pitch only added further fuel to the Croatian fire.
“We should just give them the World Cup and everyone can go home.” was Vedran Corluka’s take on the game.
Picture: Adam Pretty/Getty Images
Neymar breaks his back
The fractured vertebra inflicted on Neymar by Colombia’s Juan Zuniga was the moment that turned Brazil’s World Cup campaign from one of triumphant but emotional hope, to downright hysteria.
The knee in the back which the striker said could have paralysed him if it had been any higher, ruling him out of the semi-final was bad enough. But it also gave the Brazilians a source of grievance that totally overshadowed their task against Germany. The presence of Neymar’s shirt held by David Luiz and Julio Cesar as they cried the national anthem gave Joachim Loew’s side the edge over their wound-licking rivals before the first ball had been kicked.
Picture: Jamie McDonald/Getty Images
Tim Krul's penalty antics
Tim Krul’s was on the pitch at this World Cup for a sum total of about 10 minutes. The Newcastle keeper’s substitution in extra-time for the shoot-out against Costa Rica will go down as one of the boldest managerial decisions ever made at the finals. Louis van Gaal rolled the dice and won. Krul dived the right way for every penalty and saved two.
But it was the stopper’s tactic in between kicks that saw his accused of gamesmanship. Before every penalty, Krul went up to each taker, mouthing that he knew which way they would go, while interminably stalking his penalty area with his 6ft 4inch frame. The show of gamesmanship elicited jeering from the crowd in the Arena Fonte Nova, not that either Krul or his boss cared too much.
Picture: Michael Steele/Getty Images
Team-mate headbutts team-mate
Cameroon’s disastrous World Cup campaign was all but summed up in one episode: after conceding their fourth goal against Croatia, Tottenham full-back Benoit Assou-Ekotto was seen engaging with his team-mate Benjamin Moukandjo before proceeding to headbutt him in the face. The full-back later described his actions as arising from frustration after Moukandjo refused to pass the full-back the ball.
"I could not accept his reaction. There was so much frustration in that match” said Assou-Ekotto. "Now people take me for an idiot. I could not control my temper.”
The incident further marred a match in which Alex Song was sent-off after deliberately scraping his elbow down Mario Mandzukic.
Picture: JEON HEON-KYUN/EPA
Arjen Robben's diving
In other circumstances, Arjen Robben’s admission that he dived to win a penalty may have elicited some degree of praise for the frank Dutchman.
But Robben’s comments only acted to infuriate many Mexicans after he refrained from admitting that he had tried to deceive the referee for the last-minute incident that gave Holland a spot-kick and put them through to the quarter-finals.
"I must apologise," said Robben of an earlier incident in the game. "The one [at the end] was a penalty, but the other one was a dive in the first half. I shouldn't be doing that."
Picture: Richard Heathcote/Getty Images
Player bonuses
One of the World Cup’s biggest controversies started before a ball was kicked in Brazil. Cameroon’s players temporarily went on strike, refusing to board the plane to Brazil, after failing to secure a rise in their bonus payments from their government. When they did arrive, their touted win bonus became quickly irrelevant – with Cameroon losing three games out of three.
The money quibbles didn’t stop there as $3 million was reported to have been personally sent on a plane to Brazil by the Ghanaian president to prevent a potential boycott by the Ghana squad of their final group game against Portugal.
Not to be outdone, Nigeria refused to train before their match against France over fears they would not receive bonus payments from the Nigerian Football Federation.
Picture: REUTERS
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