A former South African referee, Ace Ncobo who was hired by the South African Football Association(SAFA) to review Sunday's World Cup qualifier between Ghana and South Africa has revealed that his audit concluded that much of the perceived manipulation in the said match came in the first half.

South Africa is seething with rage after what they termed match fixing and a rehearsed cheating which was perpetrated by Senegalese referee Ndiaye Maguette and even ball boys which benefitted Ghana in reaching the play offs of the 2022 World Cup.

SAFA has lodged a complaint with FIFA requesting that the results of the match be annulled and a rematch ordered between both sides.

The South African Football Association(SAFA) on Wednesday 17th November, 2021 held a press conference to press home reasons why the match must be replayed and the systemic cheating they perceived occurred in Ghana last Sunday leading to their 1-0 loss.

SAFA also hired a private video investigator to assess the decisions from the Senegalese referee, with the investigator concluding that most of the referee’s wrong calls in the game came in the opening 45 minutes.

Furthermore, Ncobo said he picked up 71 major incidents from the same game where the referee either turned a blind eye in favour of Ghana or made incorrect calls against Bafana Bafana.

“We disregarded minor incidents such as ball out of play for a throw-in ... We looked at only major incidents, and there were 71 in total. The bulk of those were in the first half.

“We then looked at, of the 71, how many the referee blew for, [before] the stage where we look at what the decision was, who it was in favour of and the correctness or otherwise.

“Of this 71, there were 21 incidents where there was no flag or whistle. They were either ignored or not seen. Those count as incorrect decisions.

“ ... And out of the 71, 47 were awarded. Still at this stage we have not made a judgment on the correctness or otherwise of the decisions that were taken.

“The number of correct decisions was 37 out of 71, which gives you an overall assessment of the referee and his team of 52.1% [correct].

“Go to any country and ask what fellow referees say to a referee who has received 60 or 65% — they will tell him he was poor in that match.

“The number of incorrect decisions is 33 out of 71. Still we are talking about incompetence — we haven't touched on bias.

“ ... When you look at the split of incorrect decisions between the teams, theoretically if it's a poor day at the office for the ref it should still be 50/50.

“It's impossible to get an exactly 50/50 split, so even 45/55 is still not regarded as bias. Even 60/40 would be regarded as slight bias, and you can't be holding press conferences and writing to Fifa about it. It is only when you reach your 70/30s that you start looking at an extreme bias.

“ ... Of the 33 incorrect decisions, 30 went against SA, which accounts for 90.9% of incorrect decisions that I have no fear of anyone looking at the match and at this report and saying, 'No, the referee was right where you said he was wrong'.”

Ncobo said where, because of the footage, he could not determine correctness he marked the decision inconclusive.

Further, Ncobo said he found that in the first half N'Diaye got only 37.8% (17 out of 45) decisions correct, and in the second 76.9%, which “reminds us why this ref is on the international panel ... because he has the ability to reach that kind of performance”.

Ncobo said in his seven hours, 20 minutes reviewing the footage, “I spent five hours, 17 minutes reviewing the first half ... but it took me two hours, 13 minutes to review the second half, because most of the time I was just watching football and the referee giving good decisions”.