Sepp Blatter

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Johannesburg - FIFA will be there to help but it is up to South Africa to make good use of the World Cup's legacy to develop local soccer after the 2010 tournament, the governing body's president, Sepp Blatter, said on Tuesday.

He was responding at a media round table discussion in Johannesburg to a question on whether the hand of FIFA, which had helped steady South Africa's notoriously fractious soccer industry in preparation for Africa's first-ever World Cup, would still be felt in the country in years to come.

"There's a saying, 'help yourself and God helps you', ... it is up to South Africa to take the legacy we have created - the infrastructure and the popularity of football - and to make it work," Blatter said.

"FIFA can help but we expect that they (South Africa's soccer leadership) really are doing their homework."

"The World Cup's legacy is about much more than just the infrastructure and developing football, it is also about good education and health care for all, also for the southern part of Africa beyond South Africa," he said.

One legacy the South African tournament may be leaving for future World Cup soccer championships is the introduction, finally, of modern electronic monitoring technology to help referees, at least on borderline goal-line decisions.

Speaking of the controversial decisions against England and Mexico in their crucial knock-out matches over the weekend, Blatter broke FIFA's silence so far on the controversy around the referee's mistakes.

"Something has got to be changed - naturally we deplore it when you see the evidence of referee's mistakes... it was not a five-star game for refereeing."

Change of tune

Experiments with electronic monitoring of matches were previously firmly dismissed by FIFA's rules panel, with Blatter being quoted at the time as saying: "Let it be as it is and let's leave football with errors."

However, his line on Tuesday was: "It's obvious after this that it would be nonsense not to reopen the file on technology."

There was already a hefty dossier on his desk on the matter, and this would come under the spotlight again at the rules panel's next meeting later this year when it considered how to improve high level match control and refereeing.

But Blatter was emphatic that the current refereeing systems would not be changed for the remaining matches of this World Cup.

"We understand that they (Mexico and England) are unhappy and I have said to them that I am sorry about what happened... and we understand the media is critical... but for the moment, no technology."