It would have been interesting to see it from sky's "ref cam", although as that points with the head and not quite the eyes it may still have missed given the height.

Obviously I'm biased, but I do wonder whether Bentham was just very, very certain that it was wide, which was why he didn't ask for the VR.

A head cam shot may indeed have been brilliant, for once.

Of course, so i'd be interested what you make of the evidence I have posted, in particular the clearest evidence of where the ball hit the "back wall".

And what if he doesn't see anything, except the ball coming out?

Unless you want every single decision in the game referred to the video referee, then the on field referee is going to have to use his skill, knowledge and judgement to make the 50:50 calls. When the ball comes out in the tackle the ref has to make a call - he cant just ignore it.

all that proves is where the ball hit the wall, it doesn't prove anything about the route it took to get there.

It hit here:



What other route could it reasonably have taken?

From page 22 -

The first picture with the multiple balls and the green line lends itself to the possibility of it going wide, as the ball is getting closer and closer to your green line.

The "back wall" pictures are a more stimulating as the "Fantastic" sign is well between the sticks. I'd like to have a look from the camera at the rear of Brough in order to draw a line along the ground between him and the fantastic sign. Apologies if you've posted that on a different page.

He wasn't stood far too the side of the posts, and the sign is between the posts (although quite far back).

I think its more likely he just got caught up in the moment and forgot. How often is the ref asked to make that kind of decision, and how often does he refer it to the VR? I think he just got caught up in his usual process, looked at it, thought it went wide, blew for it. Never crossed his mind to go to the VR.

This is a big mistake for a ref btw, it’s a failure of process not judgement. Any ref, even the bestest in the world ever can make a mistake of judgement, none at his level should make a mistake of process.

That "Fantastic" shot may be misleading. The ball when it is close to the camera suggests that it is travelling at some lick, and I just can't see how it could have dipped to the "Fantastic" sign but be in the shot as it was so close to the camera. That suggests that it hits something higher and bounced down. In fact, the shot of the ball close to the camera may be it on the way down rather than going up.

on the 2nd angle behind brough, you can see it hit that sign, it looks to be doing the same thing on the other angle from behind aswell but the BBC cut from that shot a bit earlier.

You don't need to guess, the iPlayer video is there to be watched.

The ball was dropping quite steeply at that point, accelerating rapidly to ground and having spent much of its forward momentum, and the shot you refer to is, of course, of the ball going down - how could it be going up?

There is nothing higher to hit. Unless you count the stand curved roof, which is many, many metres higher and was simply not a factor. But again, you don't need to speculate about any of this - just watch the video.

The "Fantastic" sign shot does seem to make it nailed on, unless Broughy put a real curl on it, although the shots from the Saints end, and your early pics, suggest that the curl was the other way.

I'm not sure if you are really that stupid, but giving you the benefit of the doubt, OF BLOODY COURSE I don't "know". I can never "know". The only way I could "know" is if I had been in the perfect position from which I had videoed the incident and was able to review what i thought I had seen.

That is why we need evidence. That's how it works. My theory was that initially the ball seemed from the back shot to be on a line inside the post. It was that view that intrigued me. So, I collected evidence to test that theory and found a lot. I did not find any evidence that does not support my theory. And some of it, such as where the ball hit the back, cannot to me be explained away. So having done the spade work yes, I think the evidence is conclusive. And so I "rested my case".


I have been rationally analysing and discussing a specific issue and presenting evidence for people to consider. You on the other hand are just wading in with half-baked bull and trying to get in some sort of ing contest argument. Why? I will leave others to judge who's the "grown up".


Now that I have explained to you how it works, as a self-proclaimed "grown up", no doubt you will apologise. Whether or not you do, I for one would appreciate you sticking to the topic and not trying to start some flame war like some drunken tap room bigmouth.

Returning to the topic, I have found an image showing a view directly down the pitch of the stadium towards the relevant end. I have superimposed in the correct location the view of Brough having just kicked the ball, which appears yellow. I have also superimposed on the back wall a yellow ball in the position where it struck the glass.



This composite, incidentally, clearly illustrates how the lines of perspective drawn on it by the original poster are completely wrong.


Here is an enlargement of the centre of that image. (the lines of the seats etc don't precisely line up simply due to the zoom of the two cameras being different, one is a wide angle view, the other a zoomed view so a perfect alignment can't be done)



I think it supports the original theory that the ball maintained a line just inside the post, and it does not support the proposition that the ball swerved or drifted to the left.