10 Terrible Refereeing Decisions That Changed World Cup Games

There are two terrible decisions to talk about in this game, with one going in Brazil's favour and the other going the way of the Ivory Coast, so maybe it's true what they say: everything evens out in the end. Brazil took the lead after 25 minutes, with striker Luis Fabiano scoring a nice little goal, but Ivory Coast held their own as the game progressed.

Then, in the 50th minute, Fabiano scored a second, blatantly using his hands twice in the buildup to his strike. Everyone in the stadium and millions of spectators watching at home could see the error, but French referee Stéphane Lannoy didn't, and Fabiano's goal stood. At that point, 2-0 down, the Ivory Coast players struggled to stay in the game and Elano scored a third for Brazil about ten minutes later.

The second contentious decision of this game came in the 88th minute when Brazil's midfield maestro Kaká, widely-known as a nice guy and fair player, was sent off for allegedly hitting Ivorian Kader Keita in the face. Replays revealed, however, that Kaká had done nothing wrong and Keita basically ran into him and then fell over, holding his face to feign injury.