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UEFA president Michel Platini has ruled out the introduction of video replays to deal with debatable decisions, but admitted he favoured the eventual use of goal-line technology.

Platini was speaking after chairing a two-day meeting of the UEFA executive committee.

“Football must remain human, but we must also try to limit mistakes,” said Platini, who insisted that he was “totally opposed” to the use of instant video replay which has been used in rugby for many years.

He proposes a system whereby “two additional assistant referees would keep a watch on the penalty areas”.

But he said that he was not opposed to a system to determine whether the ball has crossed the goal line, similar to Hawk-Eye used in tennis and cricket.

Platini, meanwhile, stressed his concern over the role played by money in football, citing in particular “foreigners who come and buy clubs in England just to get richer”.

“Of course they (the English) can do what they want, but it is dangerous,” he warned.

UEFA, meanwhile, also approved the procedure for the draw for the Euro 2008 finals which will take place on December 2 in Lucerne, Switzerland.

Hosts Switzerland and Austria will be placed into groups A1 and B1 respectively, and the 14 other teams divided into four pots.

“Pot 1 will comprise reigning European champions Greece if they qualify for the tournament as well as the team with the highest coefficient,” UEFA said in a statement.

“The other teams will then be placed in the three remaining pots based on the coefficient obtained in the qulifying competition of the 2006 FIFA World Cup and for UEFA Euro 2008.”


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