NOT A WEBB OF DECEIT

Not that I know Howard Webb personally. but he did referee an Independent Schools' FA Cup Final held at Charterhouse, when by one way and another the school had to host the final at our ground, when things went awry at the original venue, Leicester City.

Webb, a South Yorkshire policeman from Rotherham, was fantastic, not that he had much to do! but there was penalty shoot out to decide the final, which I am pleased to say Charterhouse won. GUTSY.

More testing for Howard, was a Euros' Finals tie (the finals were hosted by Austria and Switzerland), between Austria and Poland, in Vienna, when he awarded a penalty, for a "shirt pull" at the 90th + 3 minutes, which brought the game level at 1-1, when the "co-hosts", Austria, scored through Vastic.


In their Group Austria earned 1 point and finished:    P3 W0 D1 L2 F 1 A3
Poland were also with 1 point:                                    P3 W0 D1 L2 F1 A4
Everyone from the Polish Prime Minister to the man in the street in Warsaw, made Webb the butt of computer humour (see photo!) and various websites listed Howard Webb's home address, telephone and work email, in Rotherham....unfortunately it was another Howard Webb in the town who needed police protection following "death" threats made to him as an "innocent" bystander.

Willaim Gaillard, the UEFA representative at the game, said it was a perfectly correct decision. SEE..
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6bP3RvTeUIc
By the way, Webb's linesmen were Darren Cann and Mike Mullarky; just for interest.

Neither team qualified for the knock out phase but Croatia (9pts) did and lost to Turkey in the Quarters and
Germany (6pts) did, of course, and got to the Final the hard way, beating Portugal (3-2) and Turkey (3-2) en route.
They lost to Spain 0-1, with a goal from Torres. Roberto Rosetti of Italy was the man in the middle.

Spain won all their Group games and in the Quarters needed pens after drawing 0-0 with Italy (predictable) and then ran over Russia 3-0 in the Semis.

This link is GOOD! Loads of goals....
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7AcZAprBUbQ

Webb (or Howard, my friend!) also reffed Greece 1 v Spain 2, which was not controversial and that was that!