I'm not one who usually complains about referees, but that guy was absolutely hideous. The one-sided calls, the cards, the screwed up goal kick instead of corner kick calls, the disallowed goal ... just awful reffing. And it's not a "he was a Mexican ref" thing that I'm driving at. Some of the Mexican refs are very good and have called very fair games for the US. But this one individual was simply terrible and he seemed like he was doing his very best to keep T&T in the match. At least it's over with. At least we got the three points.
My main complaint was the corner kicks that magically turned into goal kicks. Despite what JP and Marcello said, I wonder if Twellman would have been onside if they had advanced the replay a few frames. When I rewound my DVR recording, from a poor angle, live, it looked like a good call.
He was crap. It was those little calls, all the missed corner kicks that eventually got to me. You could predict if it wasn't clear, he was going to call a goal kick period.
The center ref got all the major decisions correctly: both red cards were legitimate. As far as the disallowed goal, thats his near side assistant's fault, if in fact it was offsides, ESPN halted the replay before Quaranta even received the ball. I felt like he called a lot of fouls early, announcing his presence, and toward the middle stages used his whistle more sparingly like a world class referee should. All those calls in the beginning won him a relatively calm game. I have no real complaints.
Horrible. Simply wretched. The absolute worst performance by any official not named Peter Prendergast in a US match in the last 5 years. And in CONCACAF, that's saying something. I say the next time this guy is scheduled to ref a US match, somebody stuff his mouth full of garlic during the player intros...
You don't either. Sorry back at you. It was really, really bad...and I'm not one to go off on refs. He was terrible.
I can't believe there are this many complaints. As ZipSix said, he got all the major decisions right. Plus, he cracked down early. Granted, that meant many of the early calls were for relatively soft fouls against the more agressive Americans, but think about what resulted: a clear line was drawn as to what he would tolerate and what he wouldn't. You really didn't see any dirty play from T&T until the very end of the match, and that's saying a lot in a CONCACAF game. More foul calls may have went against the United States, but the US also got away from the match without any injuries from ugly, dangerous tackles that we usually see in qualifiers. People on these boards complained incessantly (with some justification) about how recent qualifiers and the Gold Cup matches got out of control and the US lost players through injury because refs didn't crackdown early. Well, Rodriguez cracked down. So a few more foul calls went against us. Big deal. We got the win, we got away from the match healthy, and no controversial PKs or debatable red cards (sorry, but Convey was idiotic to make that tackle) against us. Was Rodriguez amazing? No. But above average and certainly in the upper echelon of what we usually see in CONCACAF. Anyway, here's what I posted in the referee forum:
Nothing to do with nationality or who our next opponent is. He just sucked. Really poor night all around. And I am one of those who rarely says that about refs.
I may have imagined it, but at one point I think the linesman called Quaranta offside on a throw-in! ...and the ref was disgusting. Absolutely disgusting.
You imagined it. Just because a flag goes up doesn't mean the AR is signalling offside. It was probably for a push off or other foul Quaranta committed before the camera panned up.
Exactly, the PSG fan didn't watch the same match the rest of us did, when was the last time you saw so many different US players clearly completely exasperated by the calls and decisions? I haven't seen decision making that bad since the summer '00 tour of Central America. It was as bad as it's been in years. Truly attrocious. Additionally I also thought Twellman scored, but espn2 botched the replay as usual.
At first I was getting annoyed at all of the little miscalls that went against us. Corner kicks that became goal kicks, Convey's first yellow (just a foul IMHO), etc. But then I recalled all those games in the Gold Cup where the opposition had carte blanche to hack away. And I thought, "Gee, a bad line call every now and then is not so bad", especially when compared to losing key players (Cherundolo, Beasley, to name two) to hacks. Net, the guy kept the physical stuff from getting out of hand. And we still had plenty of chances to run up the score which we didn't take. Not the best game ever called, but very, very far from the worst.
Because players never complain when decisions that go against them are actually correct of course. Did he get every call correct? No, but no one does. Our finishing was much worse than the ref was tonight.
Look at the good side. As pointed out by MassachusettsRef, he got all the big things right, and that includes NOT calling phantom fouls in the box during the last 5 min.
This ref, Marco Antonio Rodriguez, is actually known in Mexico as "Dracula". He's one of the best known refs in our region and is known as a rigorous disciplinarian. I believe it was him who redcarded three Veracruz players this past weekend in the Mexican league. It was mentioned last night on Contacto Deportivo - I wasn't paying attention that closely since I didn't know he'd be tonight's ref. I think he did a good job. There were some minor things early that I disagreed with but the only major complaint I have is Convey's first yellow card. The (correct) decision to send off Dennis Lawrence was the most important call in the game and it was a call most refs are hesitant to make. Even though Lawrence's foul was completely non-violent, he denied Donovan a clear goal goalscoring opportunity so the ejection was a proper punishment. Rodriguez did a good job in stopping play (for the safety of the players) when Gooch and Armas collided heavily. The ball was still in play near our area and would likely have given Trini a dangerous opportunity as we had two players down. But in that situation the safety of the players is paramount. Both teams were denied a goal for offsides infractions. Stern John was clearly off, the replay that ESPN showed on Twellman's shot was inconclusive. While Convey's redcard could hurt us in the next qually with Mexico (if Beasley's back it won't matter), Rodriguez managed the match pretty well and it didn't deteriorate into the hackfest that many CONCACAF qualifiers become.
I'm glad MassachusettsRef picked up on the Balboa comments on the red card. A hideous mistake by JP and Celo not to correctly interpret the DOGSO situation than that. Credit to Donovan for hustling to get in the spot for that foul, and for trying to play through it instead of diving. Here's what I think he really did wrong: he just seemed pissed at the American team. Don't know how many of you were there live, but I think he did an awful job of "relationship management," or at least helping the US feel like they were getting a fair shake. He was, to put it mildly, very clearly a dick to Reyna from the opening minute. Maybe that's Claudio's fault, too.
Isn't he from Mexico? It's a pipedream of a scenario but Goal Diff can always mean something in a first/second place decision or, worse yet, a third/fourth place decision. Conspiracy theory for sure....but this IS CONCACAF...
While the 2 sending off were correct, that referre was horrendous to say the least. From our section, behind the TNT goal in the second half, three missed corner kicks. Plus what was with the stopping of play before half time to let the two TNT subs on?