Why now, Sepp? Germans lose ONE penalty shootout to English and Blatter calls for alternative!

FIFA President Sepp Blatter has asked German great Franz Beckenbauer to find an alternative to the 'tragedy' of penalty shootouts.

Blatter told the FIFA Congress on Friday that football 'loses its essence' when matches are settled by penalty kicks.

Football 'can be a drama, even a tragedy, when we go to penalty kicks,' Blatter said. 'Football should not go to one to one, because when football goes to penalty kicks, it loses its essence as a team sport.'

Chelsea beat Bayern Munich in a shootout last weekend to win the Champions League after the German side had dominated a game that finished in a 1-1 draw after extra time.

Beckenbauer, the former Bayern captain and president, heads FIFA's Task Force Football 2014 panel which Blatter created in 2010 to improve football before the next World Cup in Brazil.

'Perhaps Franz Beckenbauer with his Football 2014 group can present us with a solution, if not today then tomorrow.'

The task force has met several teams, but has shown little public interest in scrapping penalty shootouts.

Beckenbauer's task force deputy chairman Kalusha Bwalya also has recent experience of a shootout.

Bwalya, a Zambian playing great, saw his home nation win the Africa Cup of Nations in February on a shootout after drawing 0-0 with Ivory Coast.

Swiss law professor Mark Pieth, who has proposed a number of reforms including limited terms of office and age limits on FIFA members, urged the Congress not to pass up the chance to reform.

He also recommended FIFA set up a public hotline for reporting allegations of corruption.

Pieth said: 'I encourage you to make use of this singular chance you have to go down the reform route.

'This is crucial, make it real and you could make a real difference.

'Do something really courageous and generations of footballers and fans and stakeholders will thank you.'

Pieth also wants independent members on FIFA's executive committee and for top FIFA officials to make their salaries public.

None of those reforms will be voted on by FIFA until next year's Congress, however.

The only reforms passed at this Congress are splitting the ethics committee into an investigative arm and a sanctioning arm with independent chairmen, appointing a woman on to FIFA's executive committee, and appointing Swiss businessman Domenico Scala as independent chairman of the new audit and compliance committee.

Pieth appealed to the Congress not just to pick out the reforms which suited them, saying: 'Please abstain from cherry-picking out of this menu. I'm not saying you have to do everything, but these things are linked.'

Blatter, however, immediately responded, saying: 'Even if Professor Pieth will say we shall not cherry-pick, we cannot take the whole tree.

'It is impossible to take the tree and take all the cherries down.'

But he added: 'This is the first step, a very important one, and we will definitely take the second step at next year's Congress.'

By SPORTSMAIL REPORTER