Ireland went out of the World Cup last night when Thierry Henry cheated and France scored. Of course emotions run high and it’s easy to point the finger of blame at one man when that misses the big picture entirely.

But it goes deeper than that. According to Bock the Robber, Thierry Henry knew before the game France would qualify. He says:

He knows this because he has been told it before the game kicked off. Thierry Henry knew his team would be going to South Africa before they played one second of the first leg in Dublin.

Why?

Because we now know clearly that soccer has no credibility whatever. We can see now that soccer is a profoundly corrupt activity, with no purpose except to make money for people like Thierry Henry and his masters.

Frankly that is beyond stupid as anyone who knows anything about the game of football will tell you. A game was played over 120 minutes, there was no pre-determined outcome. Yet Bock uses words like ’scam’ and ‘fix’, when clearly it was nothing of the sort. It was unfortunate for Ireland but it wasn’t a fix.

I mean, did FIFA fix it for Kevin Doyle to miss a great chance with a header? Did FIFA fix it for John O’Shea to be found free at the back post only to hoof the ball over the bar like a GAA player? Did FIFA fix it for Damien Duff to be clean through on goal only to miss a great chance? And did FIFA fix it for Robbie Keane to be one on one with the keeper only to fuck it up by trying to be too clever?

If they did that’s impressive work, isn’t it? And on top of that, did FIFA fix it so that Paul McShane, instead of doing what any Sunday League defender would have done and actually defended, fucked up so badly he allowed the ball to get through to Henry to handle it? A proper footballer would have cleared that ball, we wouldn’t even be talking about a handball now, we’d probably be moaning about the injustice of penalties or something similar.

While everyone goes on about Henry handling it did anyone count how many times Robbie Keane controlled the ball with his arm last night? Lots. And once late on in their box too. If he’d gotten away with it and scored how many people would be moaning about cheats today? The only difference is the referee saw Keane, he didn’t see Henry, and you can see why he didn’t see it. It was on the far side of the player, he didn’t put his hand too far out, he got away with it. If the ref had seen it he would have given a free kick, end of story. It’s a shame for Ireland that he didn’t, but shit happens.

Bock goes on:

In an office somewhere, or perhaps on a laptop, if you knew where to look, you’d find details of next year’s World Cup winners, and probably the final score.

Tonight, soccer lost whatever little credibility it had left. It’s over. It’s dead.

It’s bullshit.

No, your post is a load of bullshit, Bock. Thierry Henry might be a ‘cheating fuck’ but he’s not a stupid fuck who doesn’t know what he’s talking about.

The handball was a factor in Ireland not qualifying for the World Cup but don’t lose sight of the fact that Ireland could, and probably should, have had the game sewn up by then. Our failure to score another goal and our failure to defend a bog-standard free kick is just as much to blame as Thierry Henry.

And the authorities had nothing to do with any of it.