ZURICH - FIFA president Sepp Blatter has announced the decision to scrap trials on goalline technology was given the full backing by the world governing body's football and technical committees.
The International Football Association Board controversially voted last weekend to freeze any more experiments in favour of trialling a system put forward by UEFA president Michel Platini of having two extra assistant referees behind the goalline.
The Premier League were furious at the decision, with chairman Sir Dave Richards accusing Platini at the meeting of "killing football". The league had spent hundreds of thousands of pounds on developing the Hawkeye system.
But Blatter told a news conference in Zurich: "Both the football committee, chaired by Franz Beckenbauer, and the technical committee supported the International FA Board.
"They said, 'why should we resort to really complicated goal-line technology such as the microchip in the ball that works in 95% of the cases but not 100% reliability, or the famous Hawkeye which is appropriate for tennis as the players can stop the game to challenge the decision?'."
Blatter refused to comment on this week's corruption court case in Switzerland where a member of FIFA's executive committee, Nicolas Leoz, was named as a recipient of bribes paid by the body's former marketing agency ISL. Six ISL employees face charges.
"I have briefly informed my colleagues of what is happening in Zug this week," Blatter said.
"Neither members of FIFA committees nor administration were charged in these proceedings.
"Perhaps you should put that question to the judges and not us - it is up to us to wait for the ruling. ISL is not a topic for the executive committee, it is a matter for Zug."
Blatter also said he would issue a personal request to clubs to release overage players for the Olympic football tournament in Beijing this summer, even though they were not forced to.
He added: "We cannot oblige the clubs to release these overage players. But, as FIFA president, I would ask the clubs to abide by the Olympic spirit and release these players so they can play in the Olympic Games."
Blatter also announced he and Platini will visit Brussels next month to push his ideas of introducing a rule where teams can only field a maximum of five foreigners.
He added: "The executive committee has unanimously stated this is a positive solution but we do not want to clash with European Union laws concerning free movement of workers.
"We will meet in Brussels on April 8 and 9 to speak to people from the Commission and European Parliament."
In another matter, Blatter confirmed the International Olympic Committee were joining FIFA to tell the Spanish government that they should withdraw their insistence that the country's football federation holds elections.
"I'm confident we shall find a solution but the government should not interfere," Blatter said.
