Booze making MOTM call?

IF you needed confirmation that alcohol IS still available inside World Cup venues in Qatar then you needed to have looked no further than the Ahmad bin Ali Stadium on Wednesday night.

Because whoever gave Kevin De Bruyne (left) the official Player of the Match award after Belgium’s hugely fortunate win over Canada was clearly on something way, way stronger than Budweiser.

IF you think the World Cup matches are lasting forever, wait until the knockout stage and they go to extra-time and penalties.

It is great that something approaching the appropriate number of minutes is being added on, but, as long as timekeeping is the preserve of one man or woman who spends his or her time running around the pitch, it will remain an inexact science.

Technology can rule out a goal for a player being a millimetre offside, but the amount of time a team gets to salvage something from a game, or hold on to a lead or a draw, essentially remains at the whim of the referee.

Eventually, that will surely have to change.

SOME performance by Spain, that, on Wednesday night. Seven-nil and even Alvaro Morata scored.