Howard Webb, the most hated man in Poland, receives web death threats

Ollie Irish

13th, June 2008

8 Comments

English ref receives death threats after penalty decision robs Poles of victory
EMP-6042001.jpg
Howard “two watches” Webb has received death threats on the web after his controversial late penalty decision cost Poland a 1-0 win against co-hosts Austria. The Poles have to now beat group leaders Croatia in their final group game, and hope Austria can get something from their game against Germany, to stand a chance of going through to the last eight. In other words, it’s 90% likely that the Poles are out. And it’s all Webb’s fault, apparently.
For example, football blog Soccerlens had to delete and close comments from a profile it ran on Webb, after around 300 comments were posted after the game finished. According to Soccerlens, “The comments were full of hate and vitriol, aiming sexual abuse and death threats towards the English referee and claiming that Webb had taken bribes to give that penalty.”


And a quick trawl on YouTube revealed that there are already several anti-Webb videos up, some of them very disturbing indeed.
I understand that emotions run high when it comes to football, but Webb doesn’t deserve this. He made a 50-50 – some would say brave – decision that has probably put the Poles out (watch it here). If you’ve watched the incident that led to the penalty, you have to say that the Austrian forward’s shirt was tugged – maybe not that hard, but it was tugged. Webb was within his rights to award a penalty, although many refs would not have done so.
I can understand how frustrated Poland’s players, manager and fans must be, but let’s not lose our heads over a game.

Posted in International football

Share this article: Email

8 Comments

  1. […] English ref awarded another game by Uefa Despite being accused of being a cheat – and far worse – by most of the Polish population, Uefa is standing by Howard Webb. The English ref has been […]

  2. Kev says:

    Polish people are actually just bitter of us British being so much superior in every way, such as having hot water for a real shower.

    Poland can go to hell, and besides Graham Poll is harder than any Pole anyway because the Pole cannot afford the food to build themselves up as big as that guy!

  3. ur fucking daD says:

    WEBB U FUCKING PIG

  4. nick says:

    Netherlands – spain
    a world final, how can he be the refery? He’s a focking blind fat idiot animal.
    We lost because he cant see, cant think, what can he do… Making wrong dissisions?
    I think its better for him to stop refferying. He’s more than bad.
    After that web is gay, spain is a good winner.

    Greets,

    an angry dutch supporter

  5. Big D says:

    I can’t believe how much Webb let the Dutch get away with, they tried to kick Spain off the park, their tactics were disgusting for such a technically gifted team, Webb should have warned Holland to cut out the rough stuff or face the consequences, he didn’t stamp his authority down. I started the game supporting Holland but switched sides simply because I was shocked at their agression, Webb should have been more assertive, how Holland can complain when they should have had at least 2 more sent off, I have no idea.

  6. anwar said says:

    he howard webb is man utd supoter he is a police i belive he is an idiot ref n fkn wnker to give him mbe not good send him poland as gift n he wil get whathe deserve to be a police i think it is a big english joke look yesterday man utd vs liverpool what has he don to liverpool penalty n red card u webb a r u on drugs or u taking bribe u r fnk wnka i hop one day u wil get what u deserv go to sth america or africa ndo this sht n see what u wil get nwe liverpool the rest of premiership clubs not man utd we suport poland next time give him sir

  7. Grammar Police says:

    Anwar did you even go to school that is atrocious grammar,you can’t spell can you?

Leave a Reply to Kev