Conference trucks::football;1

    
    
    Sorry for ruining a good story, but...
    
    Surely it would only have gone to penalties if the *aggregate* scores
    were level, in which case if Barbados needed to win by two clear goals,
    a 2-1 scoreline to them would have been enough to force penalties, but
    2-2 would have seen them knocked out. 
    
    Or was it some kind of mini-league, in which case why did Grenada give
    a toss whether the game went to penalties or not, unless they would
    have been knocked out instead of Barbados, in which case the situation
    in the first paragraph would come into effect, and 2-2 would have seen
    Grenada through. 
    
    Is my logic right??
    
    Paul. 

    
    Apparently the game went to extra time if it was a draw and then went
    to penalties.  Grenada needed a 1 goal defeat but they didn't allow
    draws.  A win on penalties counted as 2-0.
    
    Gary.

The way it was reported on the News At Ten was that Barbados needed
two clear goals, and that goals scored in extra time counted double
in this competition. The Barbados team figured that they stood more
chance of scoring a single goal in half an hour of extra time than
in the remaining five minutes of normal time. They therefore scored
an own goal after much debate between the keeper and a defender. The
game ended normal time at 2-2, forcing extra time. During extra time the
Barbados team scored another goal, ending the game at 3-2 after extra
time. The last goal counted double, making it an effective win of 4-2,
which meant that Barbados went through to the next round. 

There was sadly no mention (on the News at Ten) of Grenada attempting 
to score an own goal themselves or of the game going to penalties. 
I don't think Grenada stood to qualify either way. I assumed it was a 
mini-league based qualifying round, in which Barbados went through at 
the expense of some unspecified third team. Could be wrong though.
Do we have any Barbadians who could clarify?

c. Times Newspapers, 1994 - The Times, Tuesday 1st February 1994
    
'The law, they say, is an ass and more of an ass in sport than in most
walks of life, but not even the bigwigs at the Football Association
could have concocted a rule so daft that both sides ended a competitive
cup match attacking their own goals, the farcical situation that
occurred at the end of a recent match between Barbados and Grenada in
the final group match of the Shell Caribbean Cup.

Needing to beat Grenada by two clear goals to qualify for the finals in
Trinidad and Tobago, Barbados had established a 2-0 lead midway through
the second half and were seemingly well in control of the game.
However, an own goal by a Bajan defender made the score 2-1 and brought
a new ruling into play, which led to farce.

Under the new rule, devised by the competition committee to ensure a

result, a match decided by sudden-death in extra-time was deemed to be
the equivalent of a 2-0 victory.  With three minutes remaining, the
score still 2-1 and Grenada about to qualify for the finals in April,
Barbados realised that their only chance lay in taking the match to
sudden-death.  They stopped attacking their opponents' goal and turned
on their own.  In the 87th minute, two Barbadian defenders, Sealy and
Stoute, exchanged passes before Sealy hammered the ball past his own
goalkeeper for the equaliser.

The Grenada players, momentarily stunned by the goal, realised too late
what was happening and immediately started to attack their own goal as
well to stop sudden-death.   {They needed a goal at either end to
qualify - whether they won or lost the game}

Sealy, though, had anticipated the response and stood beside the Grenada
goalkeeper as the Bajans defended their opponents' goal.  Grenada were
unable to score at either end, the match ended 2-2 after 90 minutes and,
after four minutes of extra time, Thorne scored the winner for Barbados
amid scenes of celebration and laughter in the National Stadium in
Bridgetown.

James Clarkson, the Grenadian coach, provided an unusual variation on
the disappointed manager's speech: "I feel cheated," he said.  "The
person who came up with these rules must be a candidate for the
madhouse.  The game should never be played with so many players on the
field confused.  Our players didn't even know which direction to attack.
Our goal or their goal.

"I've never seen this happen before.  In football, you are supposed
to score against the opponents to win, not for them," he added.

Nobody should tell the organising committee of the World Cup.  They
might get ideas. '