World Cup - Poll Position

England's footballers may not have made their mark on the 2006 World Cup but Graham Poll, the country's sole referee in Germany, certainly did with a performance that may go down as one of the most error-strewn in the tournament's history. 

Poll, in charge of Australia's wild and chaotic 2-2 draw with Croatia, booked one player three times but forgot to send him off until after showing him a third yellow, blew for full-time just as what would have been Australia's winner was crossing the line, and also missed a blatant Croatian handball in the penalty area.

Even the kick-off was a portent of things to come as Poll blew his whistle to start the game before calling the bemused players back to take it again. After that, he seemed to settle down for a while, and he correctly spotted the Croatian defender Stjepans Tomas's blatant hand ball in the penalty area before half-time, although he wrongly failed to book him. 

But it was in the second half that his decision-making started to go horribly awry. With Australia 2-1 down and desperately throwing bodies in search of the equaliser they needed to progress to the next round, he missed a second blatant handball in the penalty area from Tomas.

Worse was to follow as Poll then created World Cup history by booking one player, Josip Simunic, three times. The referee gave him his second yellow card on 90 minutes, but only showed him a red one three minutes after the final whistle after booking him again for dissent.