An iconic moment from the Women’s World Cup
I was at an event before the World Cup started with @KellySimmo1 of the FA and @lewica of iTunes and we were hoping that the #WWC would produce an 'iconic moment' that would “go viral” and capture the world’s imagination. We discussed what it might be.... a last minute Kelly Smith strike to beat Germany, a Marta wonder goal to win the Final for Brazil? None of us thought it was going to be Bruna, a defender from Equatorial Guinea.
But as an Australian shot rebounded off the post, and Bruna caught and held the ball for about 5 seconds, you could almost see her mind sensing that something wasn’t right... she oh-so-subtly dropped the ball behind her and walked away nonchalantly. Luckily for her the referee waved play on; unluckily for her the TV cameras weren’t so forgiving. Her ‘handball’ and the non-call from the referee, has taken the #WWC from inside the back pages, to the front pages, as well as dominating twitter discussions.
There was a common theme amongst the descriptions, “hilarious” (@ DerektaylorFSR) preposterous (@stevesirk) “Embarrassing” (@sportheadliner) "awful" @alonelyargonaut.
It raised a philosophical question from @travismeyn “did that honestly happen?” as well as a less philosophical one via @jstewartbinks “could it have been a brain fart?”
Predictably, it also prompted some more damning opinions, @tanaWeingartner quoted a caller to her radio show who said it had been a “Stunning moment of global incompetence”. @samuelluckhurst said “Seen some excellent skill in the #WWC but this is an awful endorsement for women’s football”
It’s clear that FIFA agree, as they’ve been very quick to remove any clips on sites like YouTube. This World Cup has been very successful in raising the profile of women's football, but FIFA (and other governing bodies) have to be strong enough to take the rough with the smooth when incidents like this happen.
Yes its unfortunate that this has been the most widely seen moment of the tournament so far - however I'm a believer in the old adage that the only bad publicity is no publicity - and it has certainly increased awareness of the tournament just at the right time. Hopefully we may get a few more viewers for tonight's crucial "must win", "mustn’t lose" "draw might be ok but we don't really want to play Germany" game against Japan.
Given England's performances so far - @wsff_uk's prospects of winning up to £73k from William Hill are looking doubtful - but we are good enough to beat Japan and if we can avoid Germany in the quarter finals then suddenly anything will be possible again.
#comeonengland
This post was written by
