The incident that happened just before Ronaldo's yellow card. I'd say attempted rather than faked: http://www.101greatgoals.com/blog/i...mikael-lustig-then-accuses-him-of-playacting/
The referee in Senegal - Ivory Coast keeps giving advantage where there clearly is none, e.g. player on the ball, running back into his own half, has his shirt pulled - advantage. Almost worse: he's given the Ivory Coast two advantages in the past 5 minutes in their own half, without any semblance of a promising attack. They're up 3-2 on aggregate, and would go out on away goals if they concede again. It's the 86th minute. Surely they'd prefer a free kick to settle things down and let the clock run a little. Just makes no sense to me. It's almost like he's showing advantage when he means nothing there/trifling. He also gave Senegal a penalty for what looked like a dive to me (though my stream is a bit dodgy/pixelated, so I could be wrong)
I thought the PK was a good call. Drogba had his hand on his shoulder from behind. It looked like a dive b/c there was no leg contact, but the contact was all on the shoulder/neck area and Djamel was about 4 yards from it in perfect position. The PK itself on the other hand was dubiously executed. First the run-up...the kicker completely stopped before the ball. Not a stutter step, but a full stop. By itself, that was barely tolerable, but then his teammate fell for it and entered the box early. Interestingly, Senegal had all of their attackers stay far away from the box for the kick, except the taker and one other guy. Maybe to guard against encroachment? But then then one guy who was there did encroach! He got like a yard in, and then back out again. Maybe I've been spoiled by Geiger, but that has to come back.
There was some very minor encroachment by the teammate, yes. To be honest, I'd look at that as trifling. The fact that he stops himself, and backs up, takes away any advantage he/his team may have gained. If we called for retakes on everything like this, then most PKs would need a retake, which would make the entire process unbearable for everyone involved. And Roy Miller's head would explode. As for the kicker's actions - seemed fine to me. He had not completed his run up when he stopped - he still needed to take another step to get to the ball. What FIFA outlawed when they made this change a few years ago, was the stuff at the end of the run up (like this: ). What Sow did yesterday is legal.
Yeah, so I could be wrong, but the full stop is what bothered me in the run-up. Stuttering, slowing down, whatever is fine. But the stop right before the ball, drawing the keeper off his line (which is his own fault, but still), that was the problem for me. But I probably would have let it go also, except that the encroachment was right behind the kicker, directly in the keepr's line of sight. So two players are running forward (the kicker and the encroacher), plus the full stop a yard away from the ball, and now another teammate is in the box early and directly behind the kicker/ball, and he is so early that he has time to back back out of the box, all before it was hit. For me the sum of all that means a retake. But I do think that the referee had a good game and was very assertive in controlling the players, was always close to play, and ruled the pitch with an iron fist. I thought he had a great game.
Badara Diatta from Senegal with a horror show in the Algeria - Burkina Faso. Almost like he was trying to make amends for the terrible PK call that was made in the first leg (naturally by someone else). His reaction to the below foul was a yellow card: Then after an entire half of time-wasting tactics by Algeria and 6 substitutions Badara and co give... 2 minutes of extra time duly whistling in the end of the game seconds before the 2 minutes are up. There was also a peculiar situation in the opening three minutes (not sure whose fault this was, but if the players didn't here the whistle then Diatta really should have intervened earlier): Burkina Faso play for some 30+ seconds after which the ball lands in the back of the net. In the end the play gets called back, as apparently a foul had been called eons earlier.
Well in Diatta's defense the player only leaps 18-24" inches off the ground during his launch...lol. Wtf? Holy shit...yellow? I also like how he's casually trotting over.
This illustrates the difference between what is a really good referee at this level and one that is not. Compare this with the red card in the Croatia-Iceland match. It was given against Croatia, to their best player, in Croatia, without any doubt at all for studs into the stomach/groin. It is totally unbelievable that this did not result in a red card. I think if this was almost anywhere else, the match might not finish. Look at the divot from the turf! PH