The biggest name in the World Cup thus far hasn’t been Messi, Kaka or Rooney. It’s been Koman Coulibaly, the guy who negated a Team USA game-winning goal against Slovenia because, well, for no reason really.

Apparently, he just felt like it.

Coulibaly is a financial advisor from Mali who, on the side, also happens to be a referee for FIFA. Late in the game against Slovenia, the Americans scored their third goal after being down 2 nil – an amazing comeback complete. But there was a whistle just before the ball hit the net for a foul. Immediately the players swarmed Coulibaly looking for an explanation – but he wasn’t talking.  He refused to name who was to blame, even in his official post-game report.

Technology provided the actual answer for us. There wasn’t anyone to blame on the American side. In fact, upon super-slo-mo review, it was the Slovenians who were doing the holding, the headlocking and the jersey pulling.

FIFA came out with a statement saying they had the best referees in the sport and their review was closed.

Coulibaly is now nowhere to be seen and apparently sent home.

But the problem he represents hasn’t gone away. The top story of this World Cup has not been the soccer, the sucky French and a brutal English team, rather the simply awful officiating that is marring almost every match.

If you watch only one game, it’s completely understandable as to why.

The ref is only one guy making the calls on a playing field the size of Manitoba who are deafened by the Vuvuzelas, and has eyes only facing one way. There’s no way that he can catch everything, and so it’s an impossible job to start with.

But what makes it worse is the fact that a financial advisor is put in that position in the first place. If this truly is the biggest sporting event on the planet, shouldn’t the guys who have the potential to make the biggest impact on the outcome of the games at least be the best there is?

FIFA are so old-school they make baseball’s brain trust look positively radical. Change is something they don’t readily embrace. So many of their problems would be solved with the use of instant replay, but that’s a non-starter even for discussion.

But this officiating kafuffle is something else.

The simple truth is, depending on where you live, it’s not that hard to become a World Cup referee. All you have to do is start refining locally and progress through the system, league by league and get to the top of the heap in an individual country – no matter how small or how unimportant soccer is. In a place like Brazil, that’s ridiculously difficult to do obviously. But in places like the Seychelles, Malta or Mali, it’s not too tough. And FIFA’s policy is to take officials from all over the place, not just from the soccer-centric nations.

It’s sort of an equal opportunity program.

In 2007 they picked 54 guys and sent them off to a training camp in Switzerland where they tested them for a week. Out of that they got their 30 guys from 28 countries, many of which had years of international experience, but may more who didn’t.

So, imagine you are a financial advisor from Mali and suddenly you are put in charge of a crucial game with teams at a level you’ve never seen before.

That’s what happened last Friday to Coulibaly.

In countries where the sport is king, and many where it isn’t, officials are professionals. They have to qualify and train to make it in their job. They have governing bodies making sure they don’t screw up too often – and if they do they get sacked.

But FIFA doesn’t work that way. Another epic cock-up came earlier this year in World Cup qualification where France advanced against Ireland despite a blatant handball from Thierry Henry.

The ref who missed it is a guy named Martin Hansson. You can watch him right now as he’s officiating at the World Cup.

It’s hard enough for cursory soccer fans to get enthused about the beautiful game more than once every four years. If the sport has any chance of finally gaining a firm foothold in the North American marketplace, the first thing it should do is take itself a little more seriously.

Cheers – Gavin McDougald – AKA Couch