Martin Ziegler

So it's not surprising that there's going to be a fairly significant change in the flight of the ball or perhaps the speed of the ball.

Yeah, I think, you know, you would say shots that you would think a goalkeeper would normally be confident of saving, they've been caught out.

And perhaps Jordan Pickford as well against Croatia.

I think one of his was, you could put that down to it.

I mean, I do remember this on Africa Ball, the Adidas saying that, you know...

their laboratory tests made it the most perfect ball in terms of, you know, there'd never been a more spherical ball, it'd never flow more accurately, but actually people found that more difficult.

You can almost be too perfect in terms of what the ball is like in a laboratory, but when you actually play a game with it, it can behave not as you would expect it to.

Well, of course, that's right.

If you blame the ball, then you're not at fault.

And that's always a very, very good explanation.

You can say that to your head coach.

Why didn't you say the ball?

Because the ball was unpredictable, moved in a way I didn't like it.

Instead of, oh, I made a mistake.