By Andrew Warshaw
November 29 – Both venues for the upcoming Club World Cup in Japan will employ goal-line technology to assist the officials, FIFA has confirmed, ending years of foot-dragging by the authorities.
For the first time in an official competition, the Hawk-Eye system (pictured top), using high-speed cameras, will be installed at the Nissan Stadium in Yokohama in time for the December 6 clash between new J League champions Sanfrecce Hiroshima and New Zealand’s Auckland City FC, while GoalRef system, which uses a microchip implanted in the ball, will be used at the Toyota Stadium.
The two systems, which can record within one second whether the ball has crossed the line, have already been approved by FIFA after rigorous and detailed examination.
They are required to undergo one final test after installation – by independent institute Empa, the Swiss Federal Laboratories for Materials Science and Technology – to determine whether they are in proper working order for the eight games of the Club World Cup in December that features the champions from each of FIFA’s six regions.
If successful FIFA will employ goal-line technology at next year’s Confederations Cup and the 2014 World Cup in Brazil, with the likelihood that several top-tier domestic leagues will introduce it first.
Hawk-Eye is already used in tennis and cricket, while GoalRef is the brainchild of researchers Fraunhofer Institute for Integrated Circuit in Germany.
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