Collina open to halting games over chants

Referees in his native Italy have been told by the football federation to suspend matches until racist chanting stops and last season Inter Milan's game at Cagliari was held up for

three minutes after insults directed at Cameroon striker Samuel Eto'o. Last weekend's North London derby between Tottenham Hotspur and Arsenal was marred by offensive chants and

Collina sees no reason why the idea of holding up matches for racism should not be extended to other incidents of crowd misbehaviour. "I think football must bring people together and

not be divisive. If with the message we have to do something drastic, I welcome a drastic measure," he told Reuters. You may like Collina also told the Leaders in Football conference at

Chelsea's Stamford Bridge stadium that UEFA's experiment with an extra official behind each goal-line in the Champions League and Europa League had been a success. "It gave

positive feedback in terms of better [match] control," he said. "It's a good deterrent. The number of pulls and pushes in set pieces have decreased, probably because of the

presence of the extra referee. We had no controversy because of their presence." David Elleray, a former top referee and the chairman of the English FA's Referee's Committee,

said he believed technology could only ever be used for goal-line controversies and nowhere else within football. The best features, fun and footballing quizzes, straight to your inbox every

week. Plans to introduce goal-line technology in the Premier League for the 2012/13 season have been delayed for at least a year because more tests are needed into the accuracy of various

systems. One system using a chip inside a ball linked to a watch on the referee's wrist was trialled in 2005 but referee Franck De Bleeckere was not impressed. "I had a match with

two goals and my watch showed five goals. Every time the ball went over the crossbar, it was a goal," he chuckled.