Euro 2004 advert 'irresponsible'

The advertising watchdog has criticised an airline for encouraging people to harass the referee of England's Euro 2004 semi-final defeat by Portugal.
Flybe had sent out an e-mail advert directing people to "leave feedback" on the website of referee Urs Meier, who had disallowed a late England goal.

Two people complained to the Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) that the advert incited harassment.

The ASA upheld the complaints, branding the ad "irresponsible and offensive".

The e-mail had featured a cartoon of a man screaming and beating the ground, with the words: "We was robbed!"

It added: "As a mark of respect to our lads, and some of the worst refereeing in years, we have suspended services to Switzerland, his home country.

"We may think about bringing them back next year, but we won't be flying Referee Meier for a while!"

Police protection

The complaints to the ASA had said the advert "made a joke of racist attitudes and would incite recipients to harass Urs Meier".

British European, which runs Flybe, denied the e-mail was racist and said it had reflected the mood of the nation "in a humorous way".

It added that media organisations had also published Mr Meier's website address following England's penalty shoot-out defeat in Lisbon in June.

The ASA said it understood Mr Meier received more than 16,000 e-mails, including death threats, and had been placed under police protection.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/3678610.stm

It was A GAME get over it!

It was a game where they obstructed the goalie to MAKE the goal that was quite rightly disallowed Get over that too

Some time in the future...England is gonna have to accept they're not gonna win the world cup twice

sera it wasnt the world cup it was the european championship BTW lol.

Anyway ,

I agree English press' behaviour after the game has been onthing short of disgraceful, especially the Sun.

Well, everytime the English team lose at anything, they always need to find a scapecoat...be it one of the players, or the officials. They never seem able to accept the fact that their team is very mediocre

But anyway, it's a very stupid advert, and the media's been behaving like idiots. They lost because they tried to cheat, deliberately cheat, and were called for it.

Besides, when I lived there Scotland always had the better team.

Ah, but you see the difference between us and the English....

When Scotland gets put out of a tournament, we accept we were simply beaten....there is perhaps a little bit of moping, but then we go out, get drunk, raise our glasses with the fans of the other team, and go home.

English fans have been known to riot

as patriotic as i am beowolf

I wish scotland had the better team but on very very very few occasions has there been a scotland team considered to be better than the english one especially not in the last 20 years or so lol.

I would have thought england would have been able to cope with it by now.... I mean, how many times do you have to lose before your used to it?

what?!?! are you on something Scotland's never had a better team than England's

AT LEAST ENGERLAND QUALIFED FOR THE EURO 2004
when was the last time the scottish team won lol

Anyone can be a good winner (I mean why riot if you won), but it takes something to be a good loser and go home with a smile

btw, why do the English call it ENGERLAND anyway? Is that how its said in the native toungue? Like how Germany is called Duestchland in German?

I think its a football thing to pronounce England as 'Engerland.'

It's got to be chanted.

ENG-ER-LAAAAND
ENG-ER-LAAAAND

i saw the game when i was in london...and i kinda feel bad for the ref. they shouldnt have sent death threats... you win some you lose some lol but i have to say i dont think ive ever seen more team pride in a sport then in soccer...err football lol more then i can say for the US thats for sure sure we may have some hardcore fans...but not like england or anyone else.