Equatorial Guinea Handball: Obvious Handball In Women's World Cup Goes Uncalled (VIDEO)

This will certainly go down as one of the worst referee gaffes of all time.

In the 16th minute of Equatorial Guinea's 3-2 loss to Australia in the Women's World Cup on Sunday, Leena Khamis took a shot that went off the post and landed right in front of Equatorial Guinea's Bruna Amarante da Silva. All of a sudden, Bruna grabbed the ball with both hands and quickly dropped it. The Australian players shouted for for the handball call, but the referees inexplicably missed it.

After the match, Hungarian referee Gyoengyi Gaal apologized to FIFA for missing the handball.

WATCH VIDEO AT THE TOP

Comments

[AAHewetson]

04:26 PM on 07/05/2011

I guess she thought it was a player's role to terminate the play. It's a young team with relatively little experience; it didn't look as though malice were involved. Now if somebody like Messi did this, it would be a different thing altogether.

Still, it is a very good thing that no attackers were in position to act on what should have been a ball still in play ... and an even better thing that this particular violation had no impact on the outcome.

[OutAtFirst]

12:57 PM on 07/05/2011

Just like the game of life, if you act like you know what you're doing you can get away with all kinds of stuff.

[AAHewetson]

04:23 PM on 07/05/2011

The clipboard rule. You can walk just about anywhere in a commercial establishment if you are wearing a button-down shirt and a tie ... and you are carrying a clipboard.

[garylloyd]

12:01 PM on 07/05/2011

Your headlines grow worse by the day.

How about "Blatant Woman's Handball Foul at World Cup" instead of the mind-boggling one seen above?

[Paul The Octopus]

01:07 AM on 07/05/2011

A traveling violation should have been called! :-)

[Intelligentia]

11:12 PM on 07/04/2011

That should have been called!

[Jim Marusak]

07:59 PM on 07/04/2011

this ref deserves more than a few of the more profane chants i have heard refs given at different soccer and hockey games. how profane? think of a screwy way you can make fun of the ref using the tune "farmer in the dell".

[mikefina]

07:40 PM on 07/04/2011

It's women's soccer. Relax.

[Bushisgone]

12:35 AM on 07/05/2011

Exactly

[Just walkin the dog here]

11:15 AM on 07/05/2011

I understand the need to allow for women to have opportunity to compete in sports, but that doesn't mean the world will beat down the door to watch it.

[AAHewetson]

04:31 PM on 07/05/2011

I would be watching every single women's world cup game (and have in cups past) - if someone would just re-televise them during non-work hours. It sucks to just have highlights (if you're lucky) and final scores as one is trying to follow the big picture of a world cup.

I don't think the television networks have quite figured out how world cups work: how thrilling it is to be able to watch each team as they advance or fall and how much fun it is to imagine who will be facing who in the next round and how they will fare, given the current state of play.

At least, for the first time so far as I know, you can watch every game live on an English-announcing network.

[Rudderman]

07:16 PM on 07/04/2011

Pathetic. FIFA needs to clean up its act on more than one level.

[samba2623]

06:56 PM on 07/04/2011

Forgive the referee, the handball was very difficult to notice lol

[LoneRanger2011]

07:17 PM on 07/04/2011

Difficult to notice? The ref must have been the ONLY one who missed it. :-)

But aren't there rules about the color of the goalkeeper's shirt? Shouldn't it be different from the color of the players' shirt? Orange vs. red - maybe the ref thought it was the goalkeeper who picked up the ball.

[DanSc]

01:23 AM on 07/05/2011

I hadn't heard that before but that seems very likely.

[gevan]

03:33 PM on 07/04/2011

Free kick from the point of the foul, right?

[TheKingElroy]

04:24 PM on 07/04/2011

penalty kick

[RickM1969]

01:56 PM on 07/04/2011

Terrible reffing throughout the match. Besides that call the ref missed some hard fouls.

[maryfreakingsunshine]

03:21 PM on 07/04/2011

Yep

[JavaJuice]

01:55 PM on 07/04/2011

This was hilarious. Another case of FIFA Ref blindness.

I loved watching the women of Eq. Guinea play. They were a lot of fun, but I'm glad this handball did not change the outcome of the Aussie victory.

[Highentology]

01:36 PM on 07/04/2011

oops!

[canpete]

01:30 PM on 07/04/2011

more like a "two hand ball"....