The Battle of Nuremberg: the most-carded match in World Cup history
In the 2006 round of 16, referee Valentin Ivanov brandished 16 yellow cards and 4 red in Portugal-Netherlands. A record that still stands.
On 25 June 2006, the round-of-16 tie between Portugal and the Netherlands went down in history for reasons that had little to do with football. At the Frankenstadion in Nuremberg, the match ended 1-0 to Portugal, through a Maniche goal in the 23rd minute, but what no one forgets is the trail of cards.
Russian referee Valentin Ivanov brandished 16 yellow cards and 4 red, a record for the 90 minutes of a World Cup match that still stands. The game became a succession of fouls, protests and dismissals that earned it the nickname «the Battle of Nuremberg».
The four players sent off all went for two bookings, two per side: Costinha and Deco for Portugal, and Khalid Boulahrouz and Giovanni van Bronckhorst for the Netherlands. Luís Figo himself even headbutted Van Bommel and only saw yellow.
FIFA responded by dropping Ivanov for the rest of the tournament. Its then president, Joseph Blatter, publicly criticised the refereeing — as the press reported — before qualifying his remarks and apologising for them.
More than a decade later, that Portugal-Netherlands tie remains the most-carded match across the 90 minutes of a World Cup: the extreme example of how a last-16 clash can descend into a war of nerves.
Source: Wikipedia (Battle of Nuremberg, 2006 FIFA World Cup).