Trapattoni concedes rematch is 'impossible'

At the same time the FAI was announcing its intention to request a replay of last night’s play-off second leg against France, Republic of Ireland manager Giovanni Trapattoni was insisting the prospect was “impossible”.

The Italian appeared a touch more philosophical than his employers at Abbotstown this afternoon, a world away, one presumes, from the man behind the scenes last night. In his traditional post-match press conference, he insisted he only wants Fifa to “eliminate doubt” in the future rather than take retrospective action.

He does, however, support the FAI in their call but says it’s not his place to get involved.

“After the referee decides the game is finished for me. I know it’s impossible to replay the game,” said Trapattoni. “It must make us think, because it can be repeated in the future.”

Trapattoni conveniently ducked the question of whether he would have liked one of his players to admit their crime had they, like Thierry Henry, handled the ball before assisting a goal, by effectively admonishing Henry of any wrongdoing.

“It wasn’t up to Henry to say I touched it with my hand. It’s not his task to say he handles it,” said the Italian, before adding: “He cannot say ‘excuse me referee, I handled it’, the responsibility is with the referee.

“The referee should have asked Henry did he handle it and let him answer.”

Trapattoni, in fact, opened his briefing with a word about the referee and asked what the criteria for selecting such an inexperienced official as Swedish referee Martin Hansson was.

“I think after last night we have no more situation to repeat because all football, fans, support in Europe saw what happened on the pitch,” he began.

“I would like to say only, for Fifa to explain how they select referee for these important games. Because there are many situations in these games you need strong referees.”

The fact that Henry’s contribution and William Gallas’s goal came in extra time was also a source of frustration for Trapattoni, who says the anomaly where one team has home advantage for an extra 30 minutes in the event of extra time is another area that needs to be addressed.

“I see many situations like this in football,” he said, before suggesting some of them exist because of greed. “Change the rules, change the life, change the importance and the influence of money or the game loses credibility.

“They must lose this situation – and play 90 minutes and 90 minutes and then to penalties.

“If it was 0-1 and 1-0 and we lose on penalties, that’s okay but instead we are here thinking about this.”

Technology, he said, should be used in the future and is another thing he will “go to” Fifa about.

“It’s about time Fifa and Uefa speak about technology," he said. "I’m sure in the future it will be necessary... but there are too many interests.

“A 30 second stoppage is better to clarify the situation."

For now, though, unlike much of the nation, the manager is retaining his faith in the game.

“Sometimes football lets you down but like life it gives you another opportunity every day . . . it ’s football, it’s life.”