Amateur Soccer Guy Robbed Of Long-Range Goal By Apparently Blind Ref

About midway through what was probably going to be a long and elaborate goal celebration in honor of the blast Squires Gate’s (no, not a turn-of-the-century action/adventure RPG; a club in England’s ninth division) No. 8 just uncorked from the center circle, the ecstatic players in red turn horrified when the ref allows play to continue. As the ref later explains in the video above, since he can’t be expected to sprint 40 yards down the sideline as a ball screams towards goal to check if a shot that appears to have gone in actually did go in, he didn’t see it and thus didn’t award it.

The angle above does make it a little hard to tell if the shot crossed the goal line or not—which still doesn’t excuse the ref, since everyone else on the pitch and in attendance was able to spot it—but this alternate view clears it up:

The goal-that-wasn’t was cool, and the bad call was bad, but maybe most remarkable here is that there were two different cameras recording a random match this far down the soccer pyramid. The Brits sure do love their footy.

[ Guardian]