This article is being reprinted as part of our celebrations first published when mikeshaft.com achieved 1 million hits. We were delighted to pass this milestone and other articles in the series will be added in coming months.

As someone who watches an awful lot of sport and seen real and assumed mistakes by referees, I have been wanting to write this story for a number of years. Unfortunately, despite knowing that I had this photo somewhere in my vast collection of images, I did not know where it was. Looking through some papers recently I came across it and I am finally able to write the story. I will try to explain.

The BBL Championship is the flagship competition of the British Basketball League and features all member teams playing a 33-game regular season, from September to April. Matches are played according to FIBA rules and games consist of four-quarters of 10 minutes each. Two points are awarded for a win, with overtime used if the score is tied at the final buzzer – unlimited numbers of 5-minute overtime periods are played until one team is ahead when a period ends.