Blatter unhappy with players' behaviour in summit clash

Players from Holland and Spain should have behaved better during the World Cup final, Sepp Blatter, the Fifa president, said yesterday. "It was not exactly what we have, or what I have, expected for fair play on the field of play in the final," Blatter said at a news briefing to mark the end of the tournament. Howard Webb, the English referee, showed 14 yellows cards - a record for a World Cup final - one of which resulted in a red for Johnny Heitinga, the Dutch defender, as Spain won 1-0 in extra time. Blatter refused to blame the match officials for their handling of an often bad-tempered match, which was watched by an estimated global television audience of 700 million people. "It is not up to me to judge the performance of the officials in match control," Blatter said. "I can only say it was a very hard task that the refereeing trio had on the field of play. They were not helped in this task, I can tell you that."