How can anyone take this sport seriously?

It is more or less a general policy in all sports for the league to not make on-going comments regarding the officiating. Usually, coaches and players face fines if they make public criticisms. So I fully understand FIFA not commenting.

But clearly, the officiating has been rather embarassing. Are these really the very best officials that the sport has to offer? And I truly hope all of these bad calls have just been honest mistakes.

One reform I would suggest is that officials should pull out the cards ONLY if the foul is CLEARLY reckless and dangerous. Those officials who are known to hand out high numbers of cards should not be used for World Cup games. These are big boys. Let them bump into each other. If there's any doubt, swallow the whistle.

Originally posted by Melanerpes
It is more or less a general policy in all sports for the league to not make on-going comments regarding the officiating. Usually, coaches and players face fines if they make public criticisms. So I fully understand FIFA not commenting.

But clearly, the officiating has been rather embarassing. Are these really the very best officials that the sport ha ...[text shortened]... . These are big boys. Let them bump into each other. If there's any doubt, swallow the whistle.

You are robbing us of our expected bonfire of ref vanities! Bundle them up and get rid of them. Embarrasing officiating indeed. You are wrong. League does comment when a call is particualry bad like the robbed perfect game in MLB about a couple of weeks ago! That umpire had the guts to get on TV and aplogize! Bradley was magnanimous in his comments. Gutsy coach indeed! The no comment rule needs to be changed in al sports. Perhaps a little criticism might make these sorry SOB's call games better. FIFA is corrupt. To wit France is here and Ireland is not! Fairness is not in their vocabulary! That little SPaniard twerp whould never call a world stage game ever again in his life! The USA-Slovenia ref is another one! Both need to go!

Originally posted by Melanerpes
Are these really the very best officials that the sport has to offer?

no, they didn't pick the refs on merit they picked them on geographic placement alone.

Originally posted by Melanerpes
It is more or less a general policy in all sports for the league to not make on-going comments regarding the officiating. Usually, coaches and players face fines if they make public criticisms. So I fully understand FIFA not commenting.

But clearly, the officiating has been rather embarassing. Are these really the very best officials that the sport ha ...[text shortened]... . These are big boys. Let them bump into each other. If there's any doubt, swallow the whistle.

yes, look at the England v Algeria game, ref was awesome, many hard tackles, yet he was lenient if there was no intent, played advantage if there was any and let the game flow. When one compares that to the referee in the Germany match and indeed in the United states match the contrast is quite stark. i heard that the referees prior are sent video footage of what constitutes an incident and what the procedure is to deal with it, but you get, as in the Germany game, letter of the law referee who is just an idiot, or in the America game who has no consistency, and what happens, they really spoil the game.

Originally posted by sh76
Why you people can't just admit that the US was out and out robbed is beyond me.

If your country came over here and got robbed like that, you'd declare war.

I think most will agree that it was a bad call but nobody cares, except of course the team on the losing end and its supporters. This is football and the referee doesn't get to look at replays with an option to reverse his call--unfortunately.

"It was almost the first come-from-behind win for the Americans in World Cup play." -FOX News

It was a nice comeback nonetheless, better luck next time 🙂

Originally posted by Svin1
I think most will agree that it was a bad call but nobody cares, except of course the team on the losing end and its supporters. This is [b]football and the referee doesn't get to look at replays with an option to reverse his call--unfortunately.

"It was almost the first come-from-behind win for the Americans in World Cup play." -FOX News

It was a nice comeback nonetheless, better luck next time 🙂[/b]

So you don't give a hoot about the game's integrity? That's rich! You think we're sore ebcause we're Yanks? Have you not seen how I feel about the Germany ref? It isn't about the individual team for no team alone transcends the sport itself. It's about making games more fairly called regardless of the side you're on! Precisely because they don't get to look at replays they should be more up on the ball, these refs. What are those headseta for? Who are they talking to? Perhaps they are distracted form the job at hand. As it has always been said. The least noticed ref is calling a good game. Like robbiecarrobie sates. The England-Algeria ref caled an excellent game. No one is talking poorly about him. He had no greater advantage in calling his game than the idiot from Mali and that twerp from SPain. For shame. These are supposed to be pros, not amateurs!

I just watched the whole game quite closely and I have the following to say:

Bradley remains one of my favourite managers when it comes to international football. His substitutions were brilliant and he is one of the most tactically intelligent minds out there.

The controversial free kick should not have been a free kick in the first place but these things happen.

I believe that what the referee must have spotted in the box was that the captain of the USA was strongly pulling a Slovenian player away from making a defensive header. He had his arm around the Slovenian's waist while he himself was almost kneeling on the pitch and he would have brought a weaker man to the ground - which would also have made things a lot clearer for all those who are baffled by this.

Nevertheless, the referee was awful and made quite a few bad decisions over the 90.

Originally posted by hopscotch
I just watched the whole game quite closely and I have the following to say:

Bradley remains one of my favourite managers when it comes to international football. His substitutions were brilliant and he is one of the most tactically intelligent minds out there.

The controversial free kick should not have been a free kick in the first place but these ...[text shortened]... by this.

Nevertheless, the referee was awful and made quite a few bad decisions over the 90.

I respectfully disagree on both counts. USA deserved the free kick. No detectable foul at all by any USA player, but plenty of USA players being held by Slovenian defenders. Point of agreement: awful, awful ref. We need red cards for refs issued by FIFA. Are we to visit this horrible ref on some unsuspecting team in knockout phase? Teams, fans, the world deserve better than horrible little Spaniard and blind dude from Mali! RED CARDS for refs I say!

Originally posted by Palynka
You weren't "robbed", the ref made a bad call. When did a federation apologize for a referee's mistake?

This need to burn the ref at the stake is amusing.

Go back 4 years, and these boards are littered with americans with the same issues.

The way FIFA will react in response to bad officiating is by not giving said bad ref any more games.

FIFA's official line is that soccer is a game of human error, goalies duff the ball into their own net, center backs misjudge the flight of the ball, strikers balloon the ball over the bar from 3 inches and refs make bad calls. The game is lightning fast. I challenge you to watch the next game with the sound off (if you haven't already turned it off due to those blasted vuvuzelas) and call everything immediately. See how many decisions you get right given slow motion replays.

In general, I think FIFA is incredibly lame and more should be done to have a mechanism of some sort to have limited appeals against "bad" decisions. See the threads about Ireland France for further discussion how game robbing decisions can be reduced.

Everybody has an opinion, just witness this thread. The thing that our american friends will probably never get is that football rules are very open to interpretation, and this is also what makes football such a discussion worthy sport.

In the meantime, americans will stick to easy to interpret sports like stickball, throwball and bounceball. Or other sports like Ring-a-Ring-a-Drivey.

; D

Originally posted by Ragnorak
Go back 4 years, and these boards are littered with americans with the same issues.

The way FIFA will react in response to bad officiating is by not giving said bad ref any more games.

FIFA's official line is that soccer is a game of human error, goalies duff the ball into their own net, center backs misjudge the flight of the ball, strikers balloon t ...[text shortened]... like stickball, throwball and bounceball. Or other sports like Ring-a-Ring-a-Drivey.

; D

jesus, a rec worthy post in the sports forum. 😲

Originally posted by Ragnorak
Go back 4 years, and these boards are littered with americans with the same issues.

The way FIFA will react in response to bad officiating is by not giving said bad ref any more games.

FIFA's official line is that soccer is a game of human error, goalies duff the ball into their own net, center backs misjudge the flight of the ball, strikers balloon t ...[text shortened]... like stickball, throwball and bounceball. Or other sports like Ring-a-Ring-a-Drivey.

; D

"game of human error" doesn't apply so much when you're looking at 0 to 3 points per side per game.

fielding 5 or 10 balls at a time would help bump the scores up.

doesn't anyone have vid of of what the ref was seeing at the time? his angle of view? maybe he was right.

Originally posted by zeeblebot
doesn't anyone have vid of of what the ref was seeing at the time? his angle of view? maybe he was right.

I don't know of a video being available to post with angle from ref's viewpoint. I did see the ESPN analysis of the play on a huge screen and in slo-mo. Ref was wrong, plain and simple. FIFA agrees he was wrong. Will not call anymore games in WC and shouldn't. He also called a phantom foul on Findley and yellow carded him. Now Findley has to sit out a game on accumulation of yellows. Simply awful! Yet he's not the only one. Little Spaniard calling the Germany game was awful. But back to Mali ref. Blind, goofy and cowardly! He robbed the USA of a win!

Here's the ESPN clip from the actual game:
YouTube

Originally posted by Ragnorak
Go back 4 years, and these boards are littered with americans with the same issues.

The way FIFA will react in response to bad officiating is by not giving said bad ref any more games.

FIFA's official line is that soccer is a game of human error, goalies duff the ball into their own net, center backs misjudge the flight of the ball, strikers balloon t ...[text shortened]... like stickball, throwball and bounceball. Or other sports like Ring-a-Ring-a-Drivey.

; D

I think you have a point, but it has little to do with Americans, Europeans or whomever.

It just has to do with the fact that the World Cup attracts viewers who are less familiar with the finer details of the game. Of course, proportionally, there are probably more Americans who just tune in during this time but it has little to do with some inability to like sports which aren't "easy to interpret".

Watching the replay (I missed the game) I couldn't see anything wrong with the goal, but the ref blew up while the ball was still in the air.

Referees have been rumoured to blow for a foul in this manner if they feel the immediate incident was a wrong call by them, to prevent a goal being the ultimate outcome. In this case the USA's free kick was not correctly awarded did someone suggest?

I've noticed this in th EPL after suspect decisions on corners etc.