Despite failing to find form and a constant call from Three Lions fans to sack Gareth Southgate, England was able to advance to the Euro 2024 Semi-Finals where they will face off against The Netherlands.
England is currently a slight favorite in the Euro semi-final but they were dealt a blow when it was announced UEFA had appointed German referee Felix Zwayer to the match, a referee who has a problematic history.
The cause for concern surrounding Felix Zwayer is two-fold: first, he was previously suspended in a match fixing scandal in 2. Bundesliga, the second tier Bundesliga league, back in 2005 when it was revealed Felix Zwayer had taken a 300 Euro bribe to prevent anything bad (no red cards, etc) from happening in Wuppertaler SV matches.
After the match fixing scandal was discovered, Felix Zwayer and 3 other referees involved were quietly suspended for 6 months and the DFB (German Football Association) kept the suspensions quiet for several years until the German newspaper Die Zeit ran the story and threw a spotlight on the match fixing. That was in 2005 and somehow, despite the match fixing suspension, Felix Zwayer was promoted from 2. Bundesliga up to the top tier Bundesliga in 2009.
Okay, so it’s been nearly 20 years since all that went down. People change, right?
Well… The second reason England’s National Team has concern over Felix Zwayer refereeing their Euro Semi-Final is because Jude Bellingham, England’s top scorer in the tournament with 3 goals, was fined €40,000 back in 2021 for calling out Zwayer’s credibility in a post-Bundesliga match press conference.
This happened back in December 2021 after a match between Bayern Munich and Borussia Dortmund when Dortmund was ABSOLUTELY ROBBED of a penalty and manager Marco Rose was sent off, two egregious errors both on the part of referee Felix Zwayer.
After the match, Jude Bellingham said “You give a referee that has match fixed before the biggest game in Germany, what do you expect?” and got hit with the 50K Euro fine. And things got so bad that Zwayer actually took a month off from refereeing before returning.
It’s not all doom and gloom for England in the Euro Semi-Final
While the history with this referee is ominous for the Three Lions they have tons of reason to still be optimistic. First and foremost, they are favored to win because they have the better squad. The Netherlands have a great squad but England is stacked and they’re the odds-on favorite to win that match.
And secondly, it cannot be overstated that if Felix Zwayer goes out and does his job as he’s supposed to do then there will be no issues. The man has refereed hundreds of matches and while there have been some problematic moments in his past, all England needs from him is for Felix to stay impartial and follow the letter of the law.
Side note: the fact that Jude Bellingham was fined for speaking about the integrity of someone who took bribes in a match fixing scandal is insanity. It wasn’t as if he was speculating about things that had not happened.
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