Hey, leave Mr Pollock alone

I was on my way to ref a cracking game in the Kentish sunshine this afternoon when the BBC radio team exploded with righteous indignation at the national disgrace carried out by an assistant referee at the game between Bolton and QPR. The ball had been "miles" over the line, the radio commentators screamed. On Match of the Day, the aggrieved QPR player said it had been "two or three yards" over the goal line.

I'm sorry, but that would have taken the ball beyond the net and into the third row of seats. In fact the ball was about a foot over the line when the goalkeeper pawed it back and onto the crossbar before it was cleared.
I found it fascinating that Gary Lineker announced on Match of the Day. "Let's look at it in real time" and then proceeded to show the whole incident in slow motion.
If you can, take a look at it in real time. The QPR header is a bullet, there are four or five players standing on or within a metre of the goalline. Of course the assistant will be very disappointed that he didn't see the ball had crossed the line, but it was damned hard and I suspect he just could not get a clear view. That's not his fault and it was frankly cowardly of Match of the Day to pick out a mistake Pollock had made earlier in the season in giving someone wrongly offside.
If the linesman's view is blocked, these incidents will happen. Television grabs hold of them and exaggerates them hugely. Technology, when it is introduced into the Premier League (probably) in August, would spot this error, and referees will be grateful, but it won't spot the offside goal that QPR scored in the second half.
Sorry, but I can't get too outraged about this incident. Now Frank Lampard's goal in South Africa, that was annoying.