NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell has rubbished claims that the Kansas City Chiefs receive favourable treatment after Super Bowl referee Ron Torbert was spotted at a Taylor Swift concert.
Torbert has been chosen to officiate Super Bowl LIX between the Kansas City Chiefs and Philadelphia Eagles amid accusations the reigning champions consistently benefit from contentious calls.
Images which appeared online show Torbert at one of the singer’s Eras Tour gigs wearing a t-shirt emblazoned with ‘Swiftie 1989’.
Conspiracy theorists allege the Super Bowl is rigged because Taylor Swift and her Chiefs tight end boyfriend Travis Kelce agreed to endorse US President Joe Biden’s re-election campaign.
‘There is no foundation in these rumours whatsoever and the fact that all NFL officials were given free Eras Tour tickets is purely coincidental’, Commissioner Goodell told Paddy Power News.
Despite Goodell’s denials that his officials show favouritism towards the Chiefs, images of Torbert wearing a Taylor Swift t-shirt at one of her concerts has raised more questions.
‘Even though Kelce winning the game then proposing to Taylor on the field would propel the Super Bowl to unprecedented levels, there is absolutely no reason why the NFL would want the Chiefs to beat the Eagles, none at all…’, argued Goodell.
‘If anything, an Eagles win and Rob McElhenney doing something typically hilarious on the field would be the NFL’s preference’.
The Chiefs appeared to benefit from some dubious decisions from ref Clete Blakeman during their play-off victory over the Buffalo Bills which some fans branded as one of the worst officiated games in history.
And the fact Blakeman recently had to deny claims he has a Taylor Swift tattoo which covers his entire back has further fuelled the controversy.
‘It’s a memorial tattoo for my late grandmother who was also called Taylor Swift’, Blakeman told Paddy Power News.
‘1989 is the year that she passed away. God rest her soul’, he added.
*Paddy Power News’s footy news is pure fantasy – don’t believe it for a second
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