South Africa's prospects of taking part in the 2022 FIFA World Cup in Qatar were dashed on Sunday after the national team succumbed to a narrow 1-0 defeat to Ghana in Accra in their final CAF Group G qualifying encounter.
Hugo Broos' side entered the tie with a three-point lead at the top of the log standings but needed to avoid defeat in order to progress to the final round of qualifiers as one of the first-placed countries from the 10 groups in the CAF branch of qualifiers.
Former referee Dr Errol Sweeney, who enjoyed a near-25-year career with the whistle, was similarly surprised by the match official's performance and believes that questions should be raised of his decision to award the penalty in Ghana's favour.
"The problem as I see it here is that the Ghanaian player doesn't appear to have been touched by the South African player and just falls down," Dr Sweeney tells snl24.com/kickoff. "You can almost see by the over-exaggerated falling down that he hadn't been touched.
"I have seen my dear grandmother who was a small old woman, God bless her, if she was pushed or shoved by anybody in the street like that, there's no way she would have gone down, and the referee was right on the edge of the penalty area and looking straight at it.
"The only thing I could think of – and I'm trying to be fair and objective here – is that maybe he saw that the South African player had pushed the Ghanaian player in the back, or maybe that the South African player was pulling the Ghanaian player's shirt.
SAFA CEO Tebogo Motlanthe confirmed that he had written to CAF and FIFA "to investigate how the game was handled, and secondly to also challenge some of these decisions" and Dr Sweeney agrees that the matter should not be allowed to rest.
"There is history for South Africa leading up to the 2018 World Cup, where the game against Senegal was replayed because FIFA had done an investigation and found that the referee to have been, well, corrupt. There's a precedent to lodge an appeal and have this incident investigated.
"I would love to interview the referee and ask him why he gave the penalty kick but we won't get that. That's all private and will go straight to CAF [in the match commissioner's report] and I doubt that they would divulge that. But it is definitely worth SAFA's time to send in a protest."
"Don't get involved in corner kicks, and throw-ins, and handbells and pointing out everywhere where the referee slipped up. Forget about that, don't get bogged down. Only concentrate on that one single, solitary incident.
"Focus on the one incident where you have an allegation – and it's got to be an allegation, not an accusation – where there was an error or deliberate [wrong decision] by the referee.
"They wouldn't order a replay for an error but he's only 10 metres from the situation and looking straight at it. He has to explain why he gave that penalty. Was there a push? There certainly wasn't a trip, the player wasn't tripped, he wasn't punched, he wasn't elbowed.
"It seems like the incident occurred from a 'push' in the back and the referee was looking at it from a sideways point of view.
"In other words, the players were looking at the corner flag and he was looking towards the goal, meaning he had a perfect view of it, so he has to explain why he gave that a penalty kick."
Following his retirement, Dr Sweeney returned to his native Ireland and now hosts the Monday Review Show in which he and esteemed guests discuss topical issues surrounding the world of football and football refereeing.
