In the 96th minute of a game tied at one a piece, Bournemouth keeper Artur Boruc was getting ready to launch a ball to his team. As if the pitch was responding to the slow pace of play, sprinklers emerged from the ground and started spraying the players that were waiting for the kick with water.
It was a funny moment in its own right, but it really riled up Sky Sports broadcaster Charlie Nichols, whose Scottish accent made the moment infinitely more enjoyable than anyone else could have made it.
It made sense for a game like this to end on an interruption that was outside of the players’ control because that was certainly the theme of the afternoon. Just minutes after awarding a dodgy penalty to Bournemouth, the referee missed a handball in the box that would have given Wolves a chance to tie the game and instead booked a player on that side for dissent. To make matters worse for the visiting team, the ref only awarded a yellow card to a Bournemouth player who blatantly elbowed Wolves midfielder João Moutinho in the mouth. When it seemed like things were being judged more fairly after Wolves earned a penalty and tied the game up, the ref turned around and gave Bournemouth their second penalty of the day on a foul outside of the box. But, as the old saying goes, “ball don’t lie.” Bournemouth’s Joshua King would miss the penalty, his team’s last real chance at goal
Though some might argue that the sprinklers were a result of a knowledgable Bournemouth supporter intentionally sabotaging the game because they foresaw karmic justice approaching against their team approaching, I say the sprinklers, clearly sensing that the game had been going to shit for quite some time, were merely just playing along with the lack of control in the air.