Who got 3 yellow cards for one player?

The Day a Referee Showed Three Yellow Cards to One Player

It’s one of those football moments that’s hard to believe—yet it actually happened. During the 2006 FIFA World Cup group stage clash between Croatia and Australia, English referee Graham Poll made an infamous mistake that left fans and officials stunned: he showed Croatian defender Josip Simunić not one, not two, but three yellow cards before finally sending him off.

The incident unfolded in a tense match where tempers flared early. Poll first cautioned Simunić in the 61st minute for a foul on Australia’s Harry Kewell. But here’s where it gets bizarre. Poll failed to realize he had already booked Simunić earlier in the game—once in the first half and again shortly after halftime—both for time-wasting during substitutions. The referee mistakenly recorded the first two cautions under different players’ names due to a documentation error.

When Simunić committed another foul late in the game, Poll handed him a third yellow card—promptly leading to a red. Only then did the reality sink in: a player cannot receive three yellow cards. The rules state that two yellows equal one red. By allowing Simunić to stay on the pitch after two cautions, Poll had broken one of football’s most basic protocols.

The blunder sparked immediate controversy. FIFA launched a review, and Poll was sidelined for the remainder of the tournament—effectively ending his World Cup officiating career. The match became a cautionary tale about the pressure referees face and the importance of accurate record-keeping under the spotlight.

While Simunić’s night ended in infamy, it was Poll who bore the brunt of the fallout. It remains one of the most talked-about refereeing errors in World Cup history—not for the player’s behavior, but for the man in black who lost track of his own cards.