A football referee has been suspended for life for allegedly celebrating with a club he helped win by eliminating 3 players from the opposing side and granting 15 minutes of extra time, enough for the winners to score a necessary goal.
Earlier this month, Dutch football clubs St. George and SV De Valken met in a final match of the country’s fourth division to decide which of the two teams would be promoted to the third division. It may not seem like very high stakes, but they take football very seriously in the Netherlands and passions ride high, so this particular match was very important to both clubs. It was supposed to be a close game between the two most dominant team in the division, but the match played out very differently than expected because of the one person responsible of fair play, the referee. Jan Smit stands accused of not only rigging the game in one team’s favor, but also celebrating with its members after the win.
