Marcelo's not sure why a two-footed studs-up tackle is a red card.

[Dan Loney]

In other news, the sun is a big hot fiery ball that lives in the sky.

I had no problem with the Italy red card, and if the game-winning sequence was a penalty, then I'm Kareem Abdul-Jabbar.

I've been trying not to let my personal life interfere with the blogging, but I've been going through a pretty tough week or two. The other day, I hit a homeless guy with my car. Just plowed right into him, pretty much killed him instantly. Even that didn't cheer me up.

You see, by picking Italy, I realize I have put the smoldering remains of my reputation on the line. Oh, sure, they'll stroll into the semifinals. And they'll probably beat Brazil, too. Buffon has yet to let in a goal from someone who wasn't Italian. Evil will always triumph, because good is dumb.

I picked Italy thinking they would be inspired to get their, shall we say, domestic troubles off the front pages. I'd forgotten that there is no substitute for winning, and there is no such thing as bad publicity. And so now, I'm stuck hoping Margaret Dumont manages to thwart the Marx Brothers, and banish fun from Fredonia once and for all.

What is up with this tournament? England are starting to look like the good guys now. Them, and Germany. ENGLAND and GERMANY. I suppose I could climb on the Spain bandwagon, but every four years the Spain bandwagon is a Ford Pinto waiting to happen.

AND NOW, HERE'S EVERYTHING THAT INTERESTED ME ABOUT THE UKRAINE-SWITZERLAND GAME

Hm, I'm going to have to adjust my DVR timer to accommodate penalties from here on in.

[NoSix]

I had no problem with the Italy red card, and if the game-winning sequence was a penalty, then I'm Kareem Abdul-Jabbar.


Balboa going on about what a great dive it was to earn the PK is the final straw - I'll be watching Univision for the rest of the tournament.

[ForeverRed]

Sounds to me like these WC announcers have established a clear bias agaisnt the Italians....

Kinda goes against the whole neutrality of commentators.....

Shameful...

[nicodemus]

I miss having Univision.

[nach0king]

Am I the only one who thinks that Neill was at fault and thus the penalty was valid?

He seemed, to me, to adjust his body as Totti tried to move over him.

Obviously, Grosso didn't have to go to ground - he could probably have nimbly skipped over him - but Neill's movement gave Totti valid justification to go for the penalty, which was then awarded.

Neill should have remained entirely flat on the ground if he didn't want to appear to be impeding Grosso.

It's a soft penalty, certainly... but I think it was a penalty nonetheless.

[allycks]

Italy gets the old double standard on this site.
If the 50-50 call goes against them and they complain (WC 02) then they're 'crybabies.' If the 50-50 call goes their way then it's 'wink-wink' references to scandal, etc.

[Dammit!]

Italy gets the old double standard on this site.
If the 50-50 call goes against them and they complain (WC 02) then they're 'crybabies.' If the 50-50 call goes their way then it's 'wink-wink' references to scandal, etc.

One can be both a crybaby and a cheater.

A certain SanFran baseball player comes to mind...

[revelationx]

It was a dive by Grosso. Lucas Neill went to ground swinging his leg which missed player and ball. Then while Neill was prone on the ground and not moving Grosso stepped over Neill and fell over. He was moving at such a speed that he could have easily kept on his feet. Unfortunately he decided to be cynical and it was Grosso who moved into Neill and then fell down.

It was a shame that for most of the match the Aussies were battling away and refusing to fall down and rollover before the Italians. Yet the decisive moment was when as Australian did fall down and an Italian then rolled over.

Yet another example of a terrible refereeing decision. This ref joins Ivanov, Merck and Poll as example of diabolic decision making in this tournament. In fact if things continue like this, Graeme '3 yellows' Poll will have to stay, as he will prove that while crap he is amongst the best of the tournament referees! This obviously says a lot about the officials in this tournament.

[nach0king]

It was a dive by Grosso. Lucas Neill went to ground swinging his leg which missed player and ball. Then while Neill was prone on the ground and not moving Grosso stepped over Neill and fell over. He was moving at such a speed that he could have easily kept on his feet. Unfortunately he decided to be cynical and it was Grosso who moved into Neill and then fell down.

He was not prone. He was in a semi-seated position.

I believe that if he *was* prone, and Grosso fell over him, the penalty would not have been awarded.

From watching the replay again (search YouTube for it), I feel a little sorry for Neill, as I don't think he was actively trying to get in the way... but I don't think he was trying to get out of the way. Grosso had every right to be "cute" and go for the penalty.

Knowing what the Italians are like ;) perhaps Neill should not have thrown himself into a sliding tackle in the first place.

[Alan S]

Knowing what the Italians are like ;) perhaps Neill should not have thrown himself into a sliding tackle in the first place.

Knowing what the Italians are like, the referee shouldn't have been so gullible.

[dabes2]

I don't know what the letter of the law is, but if that's a penalty, it's a bad rule.

Soccer players should be rewarded for staying on their feet and punished for falling down on purpose.

That was cynical play, and if I had my way the rules would be such that Grosso should be ejected and suspended.

In moments like this, the "soccer is for girls" crowd is right. It's pathetic.

[allycks]

Originally posted by AlanS
Knowing what the Italians are like, the referee shouldn't have been so gullible.

More blind steroetypes. Neal made a wild sliding tackle, missed the ball and ended up at the feet of a player dribbling towards the goal. He didn't intend to foul (Aussie's are pure of heart, remember :rolleyes: ) but he blocked the player's path to the ball and the goal. That's a foul.

Originally posted by dabes2
Soccer players should be rewarded for staying on their feet and punished for falling down on purpose.

Neal's play was just as cynical, despite his paladin-like Aussie comportment. He couldn't get the ball, but hoped to steal the tiny instant of time Grosso needed to shoot the ball by sliding inbetween.

[bojendyk]

It was a dive by Grosso. Lucas Neill went to ground swinging his leg which missed player and ball. Then while Neill was prone on the ground and not moving Grosso stepped over Neill and fell over. He was moving at such a speed that he could have easily kept on his feet. Unfortunately he decided to be cynical and it was Grosso who moved into Neill and then fell down.

It was a shame that for most of the match the Aussies were battling away and refusing to fall down and rollover before the Italians. Yet the decisive moment was when as Australian did fall down and an Italian then rolled over.

Yet another example of a terrible refereeing decision. This ref joins Ivanov, Merck and Poll as example of diabolic decision making in this tournament. In fact if things continue like this, Graeme '3 yellows' Poll will have to stay, as he will prove that while crap he is amongst the best of the tournament referees! This obviously says a lot about the officials in this tournament.

I watched the replay a few times, and I think it was a penalty.

And Ivanov was fine. Sure, he missed one or two infractions, but even Collina did that once in a while.

[revelationx]

I watched the replay a few times, and I think it was a penalty.

And Ivanov was fine. Sure, he missed one or two infractions, but even Collina did that once in a while.

I have also watched the Italian penalty many times and I stand by my original statement. It was a soft penalty.

Ivanov should have redcarded Figo for the headbutt and Van Bommell for the subsequent 'count to five and then go to ground' dive. All the constant playacting and diving and feigning injury makes things harder for the refs. With all the incidents in the Portugal-Holland tie it was no surprise things were missed.

[nach0king]

I don't know what the letter of the law is, but if that's a penalty, it's a bad rule.

Soccer players should be rewarded for staying on their feet and punished for falling down on purpose.

Yet "falling down" in a semi-seated slide tackle in order to impede (or in this case, actually trip, as contact was made) the attakcing team is apparently the apogee of footballing skill?

That was cynical play, and if I had my way the rules would be such that Grosso should be ejected and suspended.

In moments like this, the "soccer is for girls" crowd is right. It's pathetic.

I am as vocal in my opposition to the "pussification" of football as the next man; there is nothing wrong with a good crunching tackle or some "wrestling" for the ball in midfield. In fact, you'll see a good example of good, solid, strong contact football around 5 seconds before the penalty incident took place, as Grosso rounded Bresciano. I doubt anyone could find fault with any such part of the game.

However, this was not the case with Neill.. Neill committed himself to a challenge, mistimed it *and* misplaced - it was an awful, awful tackle - and Grosso had no moral justification to nimbly skip over him. Why should he? If you look at the replay, you'll see him trying to play the ball away from Neill's flailing legs, yet his progress is impeded by Neill's torso and head, both several inches off the ground and clearly in his way. Why on earth should have to stop, reposition the ball and/or jump over a defender, simply because the defender cannot time a challenge correctly?

Neill's actions were somewhere between an obstruction and a trip. Penalty. I cannot believe that you actually think Neill's actions were in any way appropriate.

[balla]

More blind steroetypes. Neal made a wild sliding tackle, missed the ball and ended up at the feet of a player dribbling towards the goal. He didn't intend to foul (Aussie's are pure of heart, remember :rolleyes: ) but he blocked the player's path to the ball and the goal. That's a foul. When he went down for his tackle the ball was still at the feet of Grocco. Grocco then had another touch which was not very good and the Aussies were about to clear the ball so he decided I might as well try and get a foul out of it and he did. Sucked in ref. Cheating Italy strike again.

[nach0king]

When he went down for his tackle the ball was still at the feet of Grocco. Grocco then had another touch which was not very good and the Aussies were about to clear the ball so he decided I might as well try and get a foul out of it and he did. Sucked in ref. Cheating Italy strike again.

Absolute rubbish!

I'm not an Italy fan - far from it, normally I hate the cheating that is rife in the Italian game and I'm not exactly fond of their fans - but even to me it was as clear as day that this was essentially Neill tripping Grosso with his upper body.

If Neill hadn't dived into the challenge quite so recklessly, the ball would probably have been cleared anyway.

[Nermalthecat]

I've honestly been pondering whether there's any case to be made to have called obstruction there rather than a penalty. Neill wasn't really moving and he didn't initiate contact with Grosso and the ball was outside playable distance from Neill when the contact was made. How was this any different than illegally shielding off an attacker so your keeper can claim a ball in the box?

If the choice was between nothing and a PK, I much favor nothing, but it seems Neill did impede the play, so some sort of call favoring Italy doesn't seem inappropriate.

[nach0king]

As I said earlier, I see it as a trip more than obstruction. But for the sake of discussion, say it was obstruction. Is obstruction in the box punished by a penalty or by an indirect FK? I don't actually know.

Either way, obstruction goes unpunished all the time. As you said, quite often it's by shielding the keeper, but also running the ball into the corner flag to waste time often carries with it obstruction.

I wonder if FIFA will crack down on obstruction at any time?

[djwalker]

Balboa going on about what a great dive it was to earn the PK is the final straw - I'll be watching Univision for the rest of the tournament.

I can't believe anyone is still watching the English-language broadcasts.