FIFA Seeks Improved Officiating
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FIFA, soccer’s international governing body, is still tinkering with ideas to improve officiating. The latest plan is to hire a corps of paid referees who would officiate at international matches. The referee roster would be in place to work the European championships in 2000 and qualifying games for the 2002 World Cup.
That would end the current World Cup policy of having one referee from every country represented in the tournament, which has generated criticism.
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The benefit game for Daniel Nivel, the French gendarme who was severely beaten by German hooligans in Lens last month, has been postponed until September. Organizers cited the elimination of the German team and the departure of German fans, who presumably would have supported the effort.
“We had to take into account that the game, without German fans, would not have had the right atmosphere,” said Egidius Braun, head of the German soccer federation.
Meanwhile, German soccer officials visited Nivel’s family Wednesday.
Braun and general secretary Horst Schmidt went to see Lorette Nivel, wife of Daniel Nivel, to offer sympathy.
Nivel has been in a coma since the hooligans beat him with an iron bar on June 21 in Lens, where Germany played Yugoslavia. Doctors say he has permanent brain damage. Three suspects have been arrested.
Lorette Nivel thanked the officials for all the sympathy coming from Germany, according to a federation statement. Several charities have been started there for the family.
