00:00As the Scottish team walked into the stadium for their World Cup qualifying match against
00:04Estonia, they were confident they weren't even going to break a sweat. And as it turns out,
00:09they were right. Because three seconds after the referee blew his whistle to start the game,
00:14he blew his whistle again to end it. Why? Well, despite the game being played at Estonia's own
00:20home stadium, the Estonian team never actually showed up. See, the game between the two countries
00:25was supposed to be played later that evening. But the night before the qualifier, Scotland's
00:29manager complained to officials that the dodgy floodlights at the stadium were way too dim for
00:34an evening game. FIFA agreed with Scotland and ordered the kickoff time to be moved to the early
00:40afternoon instead. But this was a problem for Estonia. Partly because they saw their dodgy
00:45lights as a home ground advantage that might actually help them, but also because it would
00:49completely disrupt their broadcasting deals and their local fans, many of whom would still be at
00:55work during the new fixture time, would be prevented from attending the game. So rather
00:59than trying to shift everything around at the last minute, they instead just chose to boycott the
01:04game. Scotland were ecstatic because in 1996, when a team forfeited a match, it would automatically
01:10award the opposing team a 3-0 win, which would give Scotland some easy points that they needed to
01:15qualify for the 1998 World Cup. But unfortunately for Scotland, FIFA weren't going to let them get away
01:21with a qualification spot that easily. The teams were forced to replay the game on neutral ground
01:26in Monaco, which ended in a boring 0-0 draw. And after all that, Estonia finished second to last
01:32in the group, while Scotland did so well in all their other group matches that the result against
01:37Estonia didn't really matter much anyway.
