bigger slap to the face of american sports by a refereeing official

man... tough call

i was more incensed about the goal tbh

ppl will remember the gallaraga call. no one will remember the colibaly call. whether they win or lose, it won't be because of that

not sure how to vote on the slap, tho?

going with soccer because FIFA isn't making the ref apologize or even point out what foul he saw. total slap in the face imo

joyces call doesnt feel like a slap in the face because he apologized so quickly and profusely

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5sMX65Y3wPc&feature=related

I don't really understand the significance of the baseball one, but that press conference is amazing - it's so unlike anything I've ever heard in soccer, where everyone has to pretend they're right all the time and have nothing to answer for. I'm kind of ashamed of my sport right now.

I don't really understand the significance of the baseball one

the pitcher was about to throw a perfect game (no hits, walks, errors) of which there have only been 18 since 1900 -- pretty rare shit

I was gonna ask the grammar nazis if it should be 'slap to the face' or 'slap in the face' but I guess I have my answer haha

I feel you gotta take the response of the respective governing body into account also, so I guess as tough as it may be I'm gonna vote joyce's call. cause

-it's an early season game
-changing the call hurts nobody
-galarraga gets his perfect game, joyce gets forgiveness
-out of the hundreds of thousands of baseball games played there have only been 20 perfect games
-selig, just institute instant replay already goddamnit

whereas the kolibaly call
-gets us out of the group, but we are virtually a lock to eliminated soon anyway
-have no understanding of the way fifa "does things" so dunno what reverberations it would have
-I understand that this sort of shit happens all the time in soccer, so maybe they just like doing it to themselves

Oh yeah, these things are definitely a big part of the struggle-against-the-fates narrative in soccer - two of the last three heroic English eliminations have had very similar calls to the US one, and the heroic elimination three before that had an unfair one by the other side that *wasn't* given. The idea that they can be put right is a beautiful one, but it just isn't football.

Response of soccer organisations to officiating mistakes- total and utter fail.

well joe p put it pretty well when he said that at least with the joyce call you understood it. joyce thought the guy was safe. he wasn't. he blew it. (and as dyao says above, the result of the game didn't change, and it wasn't the playoffs or anything)

the coulibaly call was different in two respects. first of all, no one still even really knows what he saw, what he thought. and certainly no one knew on the day. second it could cost the US advancement. if it does, i think people who follow soccer will remember it for a long, long time. so as much as i feel for galarraga i got to go with the foot-hockey here.

Coulibaly's call was much harder to make than Joyce's.

Joyce's job - did the batter make first base? No, he clearly didn't. We can all see that.

Coulibaly's job - is anyone impeding anyone else in the penalty area as this free-kick comes in (his assistant presumably handling the offside aspect)? He calls the first incident he sees, which, in his perception, is a US player impeding a Slovenian defender (no, I didn't see it either), blows the whistle, suspends play. The fact that about six players are all grappling with each other, US players are more sinned against than sinning, Edu is blameless, there's no offside, blah blah, is all kinda irrelevant.

There is always this sinking feeling in football when your team is chasing the game, that any promising offensive set-piece situation in a crowded box is going to result in the ref blowing for a foul against the defending side. Like it's almost a benefit of the doubt thing - everyone is wrestling and jostling and the ref is going to "see" the attacker impede the defender/keeper but rarely the other way round.

The unpunished handball in the Germany-US quarterfinal in 2002 was worse than this.

Coulibaly's call was much harder to make than Joyce's.

There was nothing to call.

I know where you're coming from, but the fact that it's tough to see grappling going on in the box is an excuse for not giving a foul- it's no excuse at all for just assuming one has occurred because you couldn't quite see what was happening.

Also, the Coulibaly call isn't going to cost the US progression - failing to beat Algeria will. They know what they have to do now and it's very achievable, if they don't manage that they can't really complain.

not sure i follow you. if the US had won that game they'd be leading the group with 4 points, slovenia would have 3, england 2 and algeria 1. which would have meant certain advancement, right?

(for the US)

IK being a little facetious imo. A good goal disallowed in teh last few mins of a game can be legitmately held up as 2 points taken from the team, and if that's the diff between qualifying and not then it's not exactly sophistry to point it out.

In that scenario a two-goal win for Algeria would put the US out - but yeah okay, I hadn't appreciated that it would've tilted the odds that far in America's favour. I was mostly gutted that it denied us a satisfying resolution to a great game.

No, I was being sincere, just a little misguided (see previous post). If you can't beat Algeria, then your not being in the last 16 isn't that big a deal in the grand scheme of things (this goes for, um, other nations too)

All 16 of them, by that rationale tbh

well every team can have an off-day and you just hope that's balanced by its on-days. the USA were robbed of an on-day.

but i see where you're coming from re: algeria game of course. which helps salve the mind a bit.

If you can't beat Algeria, then your not being in the last 16 isn't that big a deal in the grand scheme of things (this goes for, um, other nations too)

Haha I think one way or other the last 16 is going to be predominantly made up of teams that fit the "if X can't beat [nominally inferior team Y] then they don't deserve to be there" bill

i think it's gonna have quite a few of those team y's tbh

this is pretty simple--the soccer ref didn't explain the call on the field and has no obligation to after the fact right? fuck him for life.

^ not explaining the call, fuck him

not having to after- fuck fifa 4 eva

btw Americans if you want to be sophisticated and European about this here is how to go about it

(iirc Urs Meier did talk on the record about his decision, but off his own back rather than because of any sort of duty or directive)

This is how all yellow cards should be given btw:

http://news.sky.com/sky-news/content/StaticFile/jpg/2004/Jun/Week4/1223355.jpg

joyce apologized, seems like a cool dude. his call didn't affect the outcome of the game, it affected a statistical feat. galarraga got a car and a funny story to tell.

america otoh got screwed by a ref who single-handedly changed the game's outcome. this isn't close imo.

apparently coulibaly will talk to reporters today

poll on what 'incident' he saw? am going for imaginary grappling from bradley

Thot it was supposed to be a Dempsey contretemps? Allegedly anyway; he says himself that he did nothing on that partic play which, fair enough, since NO ONE ELSE DID EITHER.

The youtube video of the goal linked above is now no good but I studied that goal on youtube on Friday and it's pretty obvious that one US player was fractionally offside when the ball was kicked. Like everyone else I don't know if that's why the ref disallowed the goal. But whether the ref knew what he was doing, the goal should've been disallowed for that reason anyway. Has anyone asked the linesman?

He called a foul on bocanegra

You can see from the reverse angle that bocanegra is getting pulled down right in front of the ref... not sure why bocanegra got called tho

To address the thread question, this was not any kind of slap in the face to "American sport". It's business as usual in football that there are decisions against your team that are questionable. That the referee is a wanker is one of the first thing you have to learn when making the choice to become a fan of the sport.

Oh lord. Btw we accept in all American sports that refs are wankers, but usually it's apparent what a call was because it is indicated during the game

Whatever the ref thought was going on, the goal was offside anyway.

And the official is made available to the press afterward

As I said, the goal was offside.

Somehow ilx poster 'everything' has cracked the code and discovered an infraction that no one else has seen after watching multiple replday over the course of four days

fifa doesn't seem to think so, since they're dropping the ref

You should email the bbc

I don't think the ref called offside, but there was a US player offside when the ball was kicked.

^that's not what was called, so who gives a shit-we're talking about the phantom foul. but thanks for your help. We get your point.

Winner here is the soccer goal by far, both Joyce and Gallaraga acted classy about it, which took the sting out of it.

"it" being the baseball play.

Coulibaly's call was much harder to make than Joyce's.

Joyce's job - did the batter make first base? No, he clearly didn't. We can all see that.

At full speed, in person, I'm not sure we could all see that. Bang-bang plays are harder to call than fouls in other sports where contact might last longer.

true but we also aren't standing 10 feet away with our entire salary dependent on observing the course of action and making a judicious call.

can't believe there have been 50 posts and no one has said: the baseball call because no one still gives a shit about soccer in the great country of the US of A

I've never understood why, in the modern day and age, football referees aren't allowed to consult the videotapes and call back their judgement if it was clearly wrong. They do it in ice hockey, don't they?

it's pretty obvious that one US player was fractionally offside

"pretty obvious", "fractionally"

they do it for very specific things in hockey -- essentially only whether the puck actually went in the goal.

if you started using replay for everything from penalties to offsides, it would take forever

if you only allowed a certain # of replay challenges it wouldn't

i don't understand why there is only one ref in soccer -- they have 3 refs in basketball & that's like 1/4 the size of a soccer field

I'm not saying they should use it for everything, but when a goal is being disqualified, wouldn't that be important enough to check the tapes?

(xx-post)

the answer to these questions is basically "because that's how it was done a hundred years ago" - it's an incredibly conservative sport

The concern is that they don't want the game being stopped all the time in order to review video. It's supposed to be a continuously flowing game and lots of people already think there are too many stoppages.

xxxpost. Yep. "Pretty obvious" and "fractionally". This video actually freezes for a second at the point when the ball was kicked. It's pretty obvious that one player was offside, albeit fractionally. I'm not saying that the referee made a perceptive decision. He didn't. In fact he would have to have decided that the player in question was active in the goal which he wasn't and then would have awarded a penalty which he didn't.

http://vodpod.com/watch/3858392-edu-offside-goal-v-slovenia

Jordan: football has only one main ref, but it also has linemen:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Assistant_referee_%28association_football%29

we look at sports a lot differently than we did 40 years ago - these days, 10 seconds after a controversial ruling/non-ruling occurs, the audience gets 20 instant replays from 10 different angles. people who didn't even see the game will watch a clip of the controversial play on youtube. audiences care about 'fairness' and in the long-term, it's a good idea to give your audience what it wants. I don't think it's a matter of 'if' for any sport, just a matter of when. anyone want to bet against soccer and baseball using video replay 30 years from now?

It wouldn't only be controversial decisions that would be subject to it but every decision. That could be dozens of times in a game. It's said that neither players nor fans want that. Even then, in soccer a lot of decisions fall into a grey area where a judgement call must be made. eg. in an offside or handball situation the referee will ignore it if it interupts the play in a particular way, or if he thinks it didn't affect the game situation. Yet the video would indicate a foul. What then? You would have to change the rules of the game which contain clauses like "in the referee's opinion". That's just an illustration of the conservative soccer establishment position.

"In fact he would have to have decided that the player in question was active in the goal which he wasn't and then would have awarded a penalty which he didn't."

So then according to your own analysis he wasnt offside. The guy who scored was clearly onside. Which is totally fucking irrelevant because offsides isnt why the goal got disallowed.

there's no reason why every decision would have to be subject to it. coaches can get X number of challenges.

xp

iatee, stop bringing logic into what is clearly a matter of tradition and the authority of authority figures.

I notice Americans often complain about the clock and stoppage time, too, but that, like the attitude towards refereeing, is designed to encourage free-flowing attacks (in a game where it's already very difficult to score) and not too much clock-watching defensive timidity - just like the offsides rule encourages whole teams to attack and not just punt the ball upfield to a waiting poacher.

It is often said wrt referees' calls that it all evens out in the end and perhaps it does, but that is a long-standing part of the game and obviously if you want full bragging rights you have only to beat your opponent w/unambiguous goals.

The ref has to actually BE MISTAKEN, though, and not laugh to Fabiano's(?) face about the DOUBLE HANDBALL that does quite potentially change the outcome of the game.

I don't buy the free-flowing attack thing - defenses can be caught off guard after a pause in the game.

xp

buy the idea that free-flowing attacks = more goals, I mean.

j0rdan: they had an extra assistant behind (to the side of) each goal in one competition last year as a trial; i think consensus is that it went well & they'll likely bring it in.

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1 challenge per half, which you get to keep if you're right. if you're wrong, corner kick against you.

i have always found it interesting how imprecise football officiating seems. fate of nations hanging on every moment at the world cup, yet the stoppage time is fairly arbitrary (though less so since they started announcing the extra minutes), guys are running 10 yards for throw-ins, the free kick spots often aren't accurate, etc.

not saying it's a bad thing, just different from say hoops or hockey, which have clocks delineating tenths of a second.

also kind of funny how strict they are, in light of all this, about how a substitute cannot possibly step on to the pitch until the exiting player reaches the sideline.

You would have to change the rules of the game which contain clauses like "in the referee's opinion". That's just an illustration of the conservative soccer establishment position.

I'm pretty sure that the rules of the games have plenty of 'in the referee's opinion' qualification as it is.

Iatee's longer post from yesterday OTM. There's no reason that replays shouldn't be used already for a limited number of challenges to offside, red card, penalty and goals allowed/disallowed. The 'flow of the game' argument is so much horseshit when you take into account how long it would take for a 4th official to confirm a point of fact with the ref, less than the average length of time an Ivorian stays on the ground after a tackle imo.

flow of the game argument is also bullshit when you see dudes clutching their faces and writhing around on the ground for 5 mins after being hit in the neck/chest/arm/foot

On the other hand, when you look at how cricket or rugby league deal with it, it's a bit rubbish when the point of scoring is a guy in a booth pressing a button rather than the ball hitting the net or whatever.

The point of scoring is when the ball hits the net, I'd deal with a delay in confirmation in what, 2% of all cases?, if it meant that bullshit calls on offsides, over-the-lines, handballs et al were eliminated.

refs subject to over-ruling after a game is still one i'd go for, if a non-crooked panel could be found, so tbh the idea of a ten second delay in goal announcement doesn't seem like a big deal.

also- it's awesome in rugby.

It was actually really good when I saw it at the cricket too, but dire for watching on TV. It also seems like virtually everything gets referred to the third umpire, so 2% seems a bit hopeful.

Limited calls imo, and yellow card to manager for issuing a frivolous one in the opinion of the ref

this is football we're talking about here

yeah i'm dreaming out loud.

also, instead of, say, mandatory sending of for the likes of the villa slap last night, if the ref reckons the other player had it coming he can issue a free 'dead arm' pass.

"flow of the game argument is also bullshit when you see dudes clutching their faces and writhing around on the ground for 5 mins after being hit in the neck/chest/arm/foot"

WORD!

also:

giving coaches a certain amount of challenges adds a strategic element to the game + puts a new burden on teams. paying attention and know when to challenge is a skill. pointless yelling at a ref is also a skill, I guess, but not one that tends to affect whether you win or lose.

know = knowing

pointless yelling at a ref is also a skill, I guess, but not one that tends to affect whether you win or lose.

― iatee, 22 June 2010 14:17 (3 minutes ago

You don't watch english football much?

haha does it? I mean in american sports a decision is generally a decision and in baseball esp. a manager is supposed to get his yell-at-ump on purely to show that he supports the team, rather than because he expects a call to be changed.

refs fairly easy to rattle, yeah- they'll (usually) not bottle a decision that they've already made, but it will certainly affect most of them if they have some of the big boys in their ear for 90 mins, added to home crowds, etc.

puts a new burden on teams

why would you want to do this? makes me think of roger federer's beef with call challenges in tennis. it's his job to play, it's the linesmen's job to make the call on whether a shot was in or out.

well by 'teams' I mean the 'people on the sidelines'. it's already a coach's job to know what's happening on the field and to react to it.

yeah but it's his job to coach, not to ref

do you want a game to come down to "well we played our asses off out there, outplayed and outcoached them in every way...but they're masters of challenging calls, we just couldn't overcome that"

i think one challenge per half would work really well & eliminate obvious howlers like a ball that clearly did/didn't cross the line, blatant offside, blatant handball. no signs that FIFA are contemplating this tho.

right, and 'challenging the ref' has always been a part of coaching, this is just a way to formalize it

xp

i don't really buy this argument that a manager would rather have a goal against him stand incorrectly then have to expand his job description to formally calling a challenge rather than just screaming at the ref.

do you want a game to come down to "well we played our asses off out there, outplayed and outcoached them in every way...but they're masters of challenging calls, we just couldn't overcome that"

yeah this nightmare scenario exactly what american football has turned into, good job

*than

congrats on totally misrepresenting what i said, iatee. you're acting as though you'd like challenging calls to be a skill in itself to be rewarded. i don't.

i think you can make a good argument for the challenge system (it makes the games more fair w/minimal delay and disruption to game flow) w/o saying it adds a strategic element to the game. there's already plenty of strategic elements! it's sport!

misrepresenting what you said how? my italics? you suggested that "a game could come down to" one team being "masters of challenging calls". and I mentioned american football, where challenges currently exist and affect the outcome of games but where teams are not "outplayed and outcoached in every way" but lose to teams who are "masters of challenging calls."

jesus you're literal

cause imo that strategic element it adds is one of its main drawbacks

are soccer and baseball coaches really overburdened w/ their strategic responsibilities at the moment?

it's not about being overburdened w/responsibility. maybe we should have the opposing coaches play a simultaneous game of chess, too, and have that factor into the game's outcome?

then it would just be american football

i don't even know wtf you guys are even arguing about now tbh

The best way this would work would be if the whole thing still lay in the hands of the referee and the linesmen. So if they were unsure of what they saw they could ask for a video review. No players or managers should ever be involved for the reason mentioned above by Granny Dainger.

Fuck a ref being left to decide what he was sure of or not tbh, don't trust half of them even that far.

if refs were generally competent people we probably wouldn't be talking about this

there's limits to how competent people can be tho

in 30 years it's all gonna be robots officiating anyway.

well exactly yeah. and i'm not just talking about incompetence in terms of untrustworthiness either, plenty of them have from for favouring bigger teams when it suits.

in 30 years it's all gonna be robots officiating anyway.

this is basically my sincere hope

also the robots shoot lasers at soccer players who dive

ref dredd

maybe sometimes they just shoot lasers randomly if the game is getting boring

i dunno we're heading into compromise rules with american footall now i feel

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soccer profile in a wc year the telling factor here

they play soccer in other years?? how cute