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FIFA to test 9 goal-line technology systems

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ZURICH - Nine goal-line technology systems are to undergo tests to try to win approval for match-day use next year, FIFA said Thursday.

FIFA did not identify the nine candidates, all from Europe, which will be examined between September and December by the Swiss Federal Laboratories for Materials Science and Technology.

"Each company's respective technology will be scrutinized across a broad range of criteria, in both daylight and floodlit conditions," FIFA said in a statement.

FIFA's rule-making body, the International Football Association Board, will study the results in London next March and invite the best systems to a second round of trials.

The IFAB panel, composed of FIFA officials and the four British associations, can approve successful systems at a meeting scheduled next July.

First, the nine candidates must show their technology's "recognition of free shots on goal, with 100 per cent accuracy required, as well as static and dynamic accuracy tests, to 90 per cent accuracy in the first phase."

FIFA also requires that the match referee must know within one second if a goal has been scored.

The message is relayed "with both a vibration and visual signal required to be sent to the referee's watch. This indication must be received wherever the referee is positioned on the field of play, or within the technical areas," FIFA said.

FIFA president Sepp Blatter reversed his opposition to tests after England was denied a clear goal in its second-round loss against Germany at the 2010 World Cup.

Blatter has said the technology could be in place at the 2014 World Cup in Brazil, though that plan will be opposed by influential UEFA President Michel Platini. He favours employing additional assistant referees beside each goal.

Nine systems were previously tested at FIFA headquarters before the annual IFAB meeting in March but their accuracy was unacceptable.

Hawk-Eye, the Sony-owned company whose ball-tracking technology is used in tennis and cricket, declined to participate because its system uses cameras that need to be set up in a stadium.

FIFA said the nine candidates can propose testing venues which have still to be agreed for the next round of trials.