Top 10 football conspiracy theories

1. UEFA- Barcelona theory

“It’s a f*cking disgrace!”…..and a conspiracy?

A theory slightly more believable than Barcelona’s secret messages to Syrian rebels suggests that UEFA favors Barcelona over all other teams (Barcelona lovers go all caps rage in 3..2..1…). Many teams have had a few controversial decisions go their way, and many rival teams have players who love to tumble around in the grass and claim they were fouled, but no team has had as many controversial decisions in big games as much as Barcelona did.

I refer, of course, to the UEFA Champions league semi-finals that Barcelona played against Chelsea and Inter Milan. Chelsea had been denied numerous penalty calls (The number is somewhere between 4 and 6, though it remains debatable), and the entire blame had fallen on the referee, someone who had been picked up out of nowhere to be in charge of a game of an unimaginable magnitude. Conspiracy theorists argue that a high profile referee wasn’t picked in this game so that the scapegoat of the multiple controversial decisions would be a lowly referee whom no one would bother listening to.

Inter had a similar experience against Barcelona, but managed to scrape past them despite the ‘heroics’ of Sergio Busquets that went unnoticed by the referee and no one else.

Barcelona have also dived heavily in many El Classicos (I really don’t need to argue this one, just head over to youtube and see for yourself). Football itself isn’t squeaky clean, but Barcelona are certainly not the forerunners in the department of being honest and upright.

Many have also argued that Barcelona players are favored over others for honors such as the Ballon D’Or. For example, most football fans unanimously agree that two of Messi’s 4 Ballon D’Ors should have been awarded to Cristiano Ronaldo and Wesley Sneijder, since they put up a performance which was far better than the little Argentine, but that is a different story, and one for another time.

Most of these allegations might just be a difference of opinion or convenient mistakes on the referees’ part, but no one who saw the game between Chelsea and Barcelona can ever say that Barcelona weren’t favored in that game.

Verdict: Definitely has elements of truth.

So there you have it, the top 10 football conspiracies, from the outrageous to the outright obvious. Tell me what you think about them in the comments section below and don’t forget to mention any hits or misses on my part, and if you are a fan of one of the teams that I have dissed, I suggest you back your claims up before you fly into an All-Caps Rage.