Referee Martin Hansson has broken his silence by insisting “life must go on” after his blunder contributed to the Republic of Ireland's World Cup exit on Wednesday.

The Swede spoke for the first time about the incident that has caused such a storm of controversy as Arsene Wenger led the calls for technology to be used to help officials.

Hansson failed to spot Thierry Henry's blatant handball in the build-up to William Gallas's equaliser on the night which enabled France to go through 2-1 on aggregate.

He told Swedish radio station Radio Blekinge: “I cannot comment on the game itself but life must go on and I hope I will survive this, too.”

Reports have suggested Hansson will still make FIFA's list for next summer's World Cup finals in South Africa and Wenger, who said he was “embarrassed” at the manner in which his countrymen qualified, believes it is wrong for referees to continue without more help.

“The situation raises a lot of problems. I support France but it is embarrassing the way we qualified. We want to beat Ireland properly, and that has not happened.

“A billion people see the incident but one guy doesn't and he is the one who prevails. It cannot work,” the 60-year-old told ArsenalTV.

“We cannot accept that an obvious decision is wrong because we do not want to give ourselves all the help we can have in the modern game.
“Being at the game, I saw the referee giving a goal knowing that something was wrong and that is really sad.

“He didn't see it, I can understand, the linesman didn't see it, but they couldn't get any help.
“In the end, he gave a goal, already knowing that it wasn't a goal. We cannot accept that in our sport and you have to do something about it.”

Wenger is an advocate for video technology, so long as the referee remains in charge.

“In my opinion the referee should keep control of the game, but when he wants help he has that resource available,” he added.

“We cannot sort out all the cases but we have to sort out as many cases as we can.”

The French Federation denied though that having video replays available on Wednesday night would have made any difference to the outcome of the game because France should have been awarded a penalty when Nicolas Anelka was brought down.

“We could have had a penalty just before the end,” a spokesman said. “Whether video is used or not is up to FIFA. It's not up to us or to the Irish Football Association.

“Obviously it's hard to swallow and we would have felt the same. When you produce a play or a film, you write it before, you know how it's going to end. But no-one knows with a football match or any sporting game.

You do not decide before to use a hand. It comes on you and it's not something that you can control.

“We are sorry and we understand that the Irish fans are sad and angry. What else can we say? That's the way it goes.”

Wenger agrees with former striker Henry that the game should be replayed, even though FIFA today insisted that will not happen.

The Arsenal boss also hopes the incident does not sully Henry's reputation as one of the world's fairest players.

He said: “Thierry is one of the fairest players I have ever worked with.

“I believe France should offer to replay the game.”