William Ling

William Ling (born August 1, 1908 , † May 8, 1984 ) was an English football referee .

Career

William Ling was considered one of the world's best arbitrators in the post-war period. The first highlight of his international career was leading the final of the 1948 Olympic Games in London between Sweden and Yugoslavia . Sweden won the game at Wembley 3-1.

He is known to German football fans from the 1954 World Cup in Switzerland . He whistled both games between Germany and Hungary , first the preliminary round, which the German team, consisting mainly of reserve players, lost 3-8, and then the final in Bern , which Germany won 3-2. He was the first and until 2002 only referee to lead a final at the Olympic Games and the World Cup. He was also a line judge in the quarter-finals between Hungary and Brazil. The Hungarians won the tough game, which the English press called the Battle of Berne , 4-2.

In the final, the Italian Vincenzo Orlandini , who had whistled the semi-final between Austria and Germany, and Benjamin Mervyn Griffiths from Wales were the linesmen. Shortly before the end, Puskás scored an offside goal that Griffiths had reported, while radio reporter Zimmermann reported Puskás as offside before the shot. Ling didn't score, so there was neither an equalizer nor overtime. English sources complained that German fans did not pay tribute to the Welsh Griffiths - in contrast to the Soviet linesman Tofiq Bəhramov , who remains in their memory to this day for the much debated Wembley goal .

In 1955, Ling was invited by the Soviet Football Association to conduct the first friendly match between a team from the Federal Republic of Germany and the Soviet Union . The game was considered the first attempt at rapprochement between the two states, which at that time had not yet established diplomatic relations.

Individual evidence

1. ↑ 1954 World Cup Statistics : TotalFootball.org website.
2. ↑ West Germany v. Hungary ( Memento of September 29, 2007 in the Internet Archive ), 1958 World Cup Final: BritishEmbassyWorldCup website.