Posted by Luke Cyphers

JOHANNESBURG -- The president of U.S. Soccer didn't see either World Cup match on Sunday, and so was a bit discrete in commenting on the tournament's ongoing, and inflating, officiating controversy.

Nonetheless, Sunil Gulati believes the missed England goal in the England-Germany match and the missed offside call that benefited Argentina in its victory over Mexico could bring changes to the game.

"It's a very, very difficult situation," Gulati said of an issue that people at all levels of FIFA are talking about. Gulati said that in an informal conversation with a FIFA executive committee member on Sunday, the official outlined ideas for a system of replay challenges similar to the one used by the NFL.

"I don't think there's any doubt that FIFA will look at what's happened here, and whether it's additional referees or some limited form of goal-line technology, which they've looked at, they'll look at some things," Gulati said.

Gulati spoke Monday of how difficult the referee's job is, with so much space to cover and the speed of the game. "And there are so many decisions that can mean a goal," he said. But a challenge system could impede the flow of the game and be used and abused -- Gulati agreed that a tactical challenge could have been used by Algeria, for instance, to stop the counterattack that Tim Howard started in stoppage time, which ultimately ended with Landon Donovan's dramatic, game-winning goal.

Nonetheless, this tournament demands some kind of change. "Yesterday you have a situation [in the England match] where a billion people know that it was a goal," Gulati said. "One or two didn't. That makes it pretty hard."

He'd be open to conducting trials for new officiating technologies in MLS. "We've talked to them very gently: If you're going to try some things, we'd be happy to do some trial cases," he said. "Like an additional referee or technology. I think they're going to continue to look at that. Referees haven't gotten worse. Technology's gotten better."