Goals are gold

In the game of football, the concept of scoring goals seems to be an important aspect in the game but what if the two teams playing against each other ends the game with the same score? What if both the teams fail to score more goals in the extra time of thirty minutes? It is at this moment when the concept of golden goals comes to the forefront. It is through this rule that the winner needs to be decided. The rule states that while the game is going on (after the extra time), the team who scores the first goal wins the match at that instant of scoring the goal. Therefore, the people watching the match live (either at the stadium or on TV), are on their toes always.

A golden goal brings an element of surprise as sometimes a team which plays a defensive role for the maximum time, scores a sudden unexpected goal and wins the match. Even though the losing team's heart breaks, they are helpless.

 Sudden Death

The rule of golden goal is also sometimes called ‘sudden death' as the team which scores the goal, beats their opponent team directly. Earlier, FIFA had named this rule sudden death but it sounded offensive to many people and therefore it was renamed golden goal.

 The first golden goal had been scored by the Australian team against Uruguay at a uarter-final match (at the FIFA World Youth Championships) on March 1993. The first English player to score a golden goal was Iian Dunn (of HuddersfieldTown) while playing against LincolnCity. In the Euro Cup of 2000, France defeated Italy by scoring a golden goal. Earlier, in the same tournament, France's Zidane converted the spot kick (during the extra time) against Italy and marched his team to the finals.

 In the 1998 World Cup, France defeated Paraguay by scoring in the 113th minute of the game. France had also defeated Cameroon in the 2003 Confederations Cup when Henry scored the golden goal for the former team.

 The importance of golden goals could also be realized when we see that we need to decide something in order to decide the winner. As sometimes, both the teams playing against each other may be such that they don't allow the other team to score more goals than them. Thus, there has to be made a mandatory rule in order to see that a winner comes out as a result of the match.

But in those matches, when the game ends in a goalless draw after ninety minutes, the extra time golden goal provides an added energy to the spectators as they always expect their team to score goals and entertain them.

The only people who seem to be somewhat sad with this idea of golden goal are the players. It is they who spend the ninety minutes trying their best to score a goal or two. But the idea of extra time disappoints them because of their tiredness. They are soon asked to prepare for the extra time with added energy. But players do get energized and add the extra time with extra vigour with the object of winning the match.