You're wrong Charlie Dempsey

You're wrong Charlie Dempsey

Here here.

well put lg! the artice i read in the herald today was the first time id ever read a different side to that story. i was in england when that happened and i seem to remember he was copping it over there too

I have to laugh a little bit at the 'this is the first time we've heard about this side of the story'

If anyone had read about it all when it happened, it was covered quite extensively as to the whys and why nots and I was left under no illusion as to why Charlie did what he did. The interview doesn't shed any new light on his side of the story because its the same story that was mentioned all those years ago and its exactly the same as Matheson wrote it in this article.

R I P Charlie

You can laugh but what i remember at the time was Charlie telling the press he would not pass any comments until he was back home and had spoken with the Oceania council. Th erest of the stuff in the media was speculation at the time.

Actually I think that story just made him look weak.  He was more concerned about protecting his own reputation than doing what he had been instructed to do by his own federation.

Knowing little about it beyond this interview, it does seem that the OFC had given the instruction to vote for England but with no plan B, plan C, plan D etc etc to cover the possibility that England would not be in the final running. You'd think that they would have considered every possibility and Dempsey therefore would not have been put under so much pressure.

I read the interview and thought he came across as weak.  People were putting pressure on him, the world cup was at stake and he was there to vote.  He bottled out so as not to upset anyone and went and played golf to get away from the pressure.  And Devlin asked him some difficult questions when he got back which he couldn't answer.  A silly old man who shouldn't have even been there in the first place. 

Exactly my thoughts Jose's dog.  Not an easy situation but surely the fact that every other person there knew the situation and he was blind to the fact that his vote was going to be the deciding one meant that he had failed Oceania.  james dean2008-07-01 21:10:07

Well, didn't a few AFC votes jump sides and that swung it away from South Africa? They were really the main reason, not the OFC non-vote, for Germany to get it.

If they stayed voting for South Africa in the last round, then this would have been a side issue of very little significance.

At least he had the nerve to stay honest about his intentions unlike those AFC late swing votes. You would have to say those AFC voters were under the same pressure than Old Charlie boy to have to swing their votes after two rounds voting for South Africa and unlike Charlie they were the real backstabbers to the South Africa cause.

Charlie only backstabbed the OFC for not voting as per three round instructions. He didn't backstabbed the South Africa because he never voted for them in the first two rounds. He was always going to vote for England and no one else.

It was only a first non-vote that happened in a close fought contest. In previous votings, it has never got this close.