Football's hall of shame

FOLLOWING Arsene Wenger's unprecedented offer to replay the FA Cup fifth round match between Arsenal and Sheffield United, many football supporters across the country, will no doubt reflect on past incidents where natural justice was not quite so well served, writes Alex Hayes.

When relegation-threatened Blackburn played Arsenal in the League in 1997, Chris Sutton latched on to a throw-in from one of his team-mates, which was actually aimed at David Seaman to return possession to Arsenal, following a injury to a player. After muscling the ball off the unsuspecting Arsenal defender Lee Dixon, Sutton passed the ball to a team-mate who duly scored.

Diego Maradona scored the infamous "Hand of God" goal against England, in the quarter final of the World Cup in Mexico, 1986. The Argentinian number 10 leapt ahead of Peter Shilton and palmed the ball into the empty net. Last summer, Maradona admitted cheating: "The goal should not have stood and I am sorry for what happened," he said some twelve years too late.

Laurent Blanc, the Marseille and France centre-back was shown the red card during the semi-final of the World Cup in France last year against Croatia for apparently punching Slaven Bilic in the face. Video replays, however, showed that Blanc had made minimal contact with the Everton player, and should not have been sent off.