I don't know what you think is so wrong with his mechanics? If the keeper had gotten it, flag stays down, life moves on. If Dzeko tripped and fell and a player from an onside position then has a chance to run onto it, flag stays down. Granted, the odds that a professional trips or slips are much lower than say, a U15 player like I observed, but it does happen from time to time. While the AR's judgment might be in question, there is no way his mechanics are.
I will change my mind on the Nigeria goal. On the first few replays I was looking for upper body contact and didn't see the trip. Makes me wonder if O'Leary did the same. That type of situation ususally results in an upper body foul.
Be completely honest, the first time I saw this replay: http://gfycat.com/SoupyCaringBobwhite , I was looking at the Bosnian player's right arm and how high he brings it up as it swings back a little. If the Nigerian player doesn't bring his right arm up to protect his face as he swims to the other side, that could have been an ugly elbow to the nose. So, yeah, all the upper body stuff is going to be the focus there between the swinging arm and then the swim motion by the Nigerian. You're right that there is clear contact to the legs, though. And that almost always gets called. O'Leary was going to be up against it no matter what, coming from Oceania. His ARs look to have let him down in this one and I can't see him getting another game. It's worth noting, however, that the called back goal for Bosnia is the kind of incident that was regularly called wrong all the way up to WC06 or so (and yes, I know that if I go too far back, "even is on" didn't yet exist). My point is that we've come a long way in the professionalization of officials and the specialization of ARs when everyone pretty much agrees this is an unacceptable mistake. At this level, it unfortunately is. But as others have said, that's a lot closer than it looks when you freeze the incident on replay. Bonus ref nerd cite: anyone see the Eric Boria cameo in the clip above? Odd positioning for the RAR; wonder if he was there all game, or down there for a reason.
The trip was not intentional, but even so it was a foul. I don't know if the referee was positioned well enough to notice it, though.
Yep, that was definitely the problem. The AR should have been standing ten yards upfield and looking at the striker; then he would certainly have gotten the call right.
Cut the stupid mocking "smilies," please. As I stated, it's my opinion. You're free to disagree. The AR was looking at the line, what he probably couldn't see clearly is the instant when the kick happens. If you think it happened 0.1 s after it did, it's offside. The CR is in a position where he can see all three: kick, defender, Dzeko.
We could cut the mocking smilies and just flatly tell you that you don't know what you're talking about. I presume you're a fan of the sport. When is the last time you saw a referee call an offside without his assistant? Or wave down a flag (other than in the situation where the defense has played the ball back)? You're declaring things that are just wrong. ARs exist for a reason. The ARs' duty is to get the offside decision. The CR isn't there as some sort of backup. He's watching for fouls. He's in no position whatsoever to judge offside. How you think he's in line to see the defender and Dzeko, when he's 10 yards up field and perpendicular, is absolutely beyond me. You do realize that ARs get decisions wrong when they are about 0.5 meters out of position, right? The CR has no clue... I mean, literally no clue... the relative positioning of Dzeko and the defender at the moment that ball is touched. That's why we have ARs. The ignorance you're showing for how officiating the sport works is shocking.
Quite possible. Not just a fan, but played it as amateur when I was much younger. Never been on the officiating side, so it's never been my concern. There are instances where the CR over-rides his AR, even for offside calls. Seen it happen, but I'm not about to scour the Internet for an hour to find evidence of it. Believe me or not, it's up to you. I feel this was one of those occasions that called for a talk and an over-ride. The AR got the line right, but a fraction of a second too late. At any rate, I'm feeling very upset over the call, followed by allowing the foul. Two crucial calls against the same team. Two crucial calls that send a team home. At the very least, the CR should have tried to 'compensate' (as they often do) by calling it a foul on Emenike, even if he was not 100% certain. PS: Plenty of cases of referees disregarding offside flags by their AR posted on these forums. This is one: http://soccerrefereeusa.com/index.p...gnores-ar-flag-and-confirms-goal?limitstart=0 So don't pretend it doesn't happen.
Not at this level. Period. I've called an offside when I have a 14-year-old AR who missed the attacker being off by three yards. Otherwise, as a center I don't have the angle. There is no way O'Leary or any referee could tell off/on on neither this, nor most close decisions.
Also, "compensating" is a whole other rabbit hole. Where it happens, it is subconscious--I can't imagine any referee at this level actively looking for a way to even things out, and no good one at any level would.
I find it a bit ironic that it's never been your concern, but it is now. Look, if you want to complain or ask questions, that's fine. But to flatly say how things should be when you admit officiating has never been your concern is kind of funny. I don't believe you. You could scour the Internet for days and you won't find an instance at the international level. At least not within the last 30 years. And before you take that as a challenge and try to prove me wrong, the point here is we are talking about a situation where the referee would overrule an AR on an offside position decision. Overrules (or conferences) happen when the AR doesn't realize the defender last touched the ball or the AR isn't sure if the goalkeeper was screened, etc. That's how officiating teamwork is supposed to work. But overruling a call about offside position? Doesn't happen. Never will. Er, given offside is all about timing, that means he didn't get the line right. You can't get the line right and be late (or early). You either get the line right or you don't. And... scene.
You are giving examples that involve an opinion of if the player interfered with active play not of the center judging that a player was in an onside position when the AR said he wasn't. Apples to oranges probably doesn't fit here. More like apples to hard tack.
There was contact between their legs but it was incidental and caused equally by both tbh. Besides the defender was off balance and struggling due to being outpaced in change of direction anyway. I don't get what the attacker is supposed to do when the defender gets his body in between while he is cutting in and has the beating of him for pace ? And if he stops will Obstruction be called against the defender ? Defenders when they know they are beaten for pace try to do this too often and earn a foul.
There is no way the AR can be waved down there. I have been in situations like that where I was 100% positive the attacker timed it right, but there is no way I could have waved my AR down. Your AR loses all credibility the rest of the game. I bet O'Leary had a good idea that his AR might have been wrong there but the risk of waving him down and his AR turning out to be actually right is way greater than the reward. Your international career might be over and your long time colleague/friend might never talk to you again. Granted, if O'Leary did wave him down it probably would have been the greatest piece of officiating in World Cup history. But he didn't and this still is. The call, for me, that got Elizondo the Final in '06.
How do you come to that conclusion based on everything you just wrote?! It would have been a complete and utter guess, taking away a decision at the World Cup stage from a teammate who has been training for over a decade, primarily making such decisions, while you have probably made zero of them over the same time period. It would have been one of the most arrogant pieces of officiating ever seen. It would have prompted the sort of dissent from Nigeria that would normally lead to abandoning a match. And it would have meant every single offside decision the rest of the game from that AR would be irrelevant. It would have been right--based on pure dumb luck. But it would be one of the worst officiating decisions we've seen the modern era. Luckily, except for a few people here, the notion would never be seriously entertained in officiating circles.
It does not happen at the professional level. The game moves too quickly at this level. The relative position of players along the offside line requires tremendous concentration on the assistant referees part to judge offside accurately and correctly. Just because some grade 8 official waved down an AR does not mean it happens at this level. The crew is striving for 100 percent accuracy. Referees will only wave down offside if the offense is trifling. The ball is caught by the keeper in the penalty area or a defender traps the ball with no pressure or the referee notices the ball was played or passed to a player that is on side. Sometimes it is difficult on a high ball for the AR to judge if it is passed to the center or further to the far side of the field.
We're not debating my or your credentials here. We're talking about a call in a game. There is a reason why "ad hominem" and "appeal to authority" are fallacies: they deflect from the topic at hand. The CR can over-ride the AR. That is one of his powers. It's in the handbook. It happens. If it happens in the Brazilian Serie A (top level league football), then it can happen in a WC. Period. Bahia and Flamengo are not U-14 teams. It happens even at the highest level. So enough of trying to dismiss the counter-example, it only attests to a total inability and unwillingness to discuss the subject with a cold head. I have no allegiance to either Bosnia or Nigeria. I just feel this is extremely unfair. I oppose video reviews, because of the universality of the game, and the scarcity of such resources. However, an instance like this, helps those arguing that it should be used. Which I find bad for my own position. That's the limit of my involvement with this incident. I stick by my position. The AR was not in an ideal situation to see the instant of the kick. Getting it wrong by a fraction of a second was enough to make the bad call. This is one of the rare occasions when, to my eyes, the CR had the best position to appreciate all three elements of the play. He should have over-ridden the AR. It's within his powers to do so, and is not unheard of even at the top league level.
He would have gotten the decision right! That's the whole point. It couldn't have been one of the worst decisions in the modern era because the right call would have been made. I know the thought never even crossed O'Leary's head, but to blast me for saying, that, hypothetically, it would have been a great decision is, frankly, ridiculous. How can it be a horrible decision if he got the call right? I bet if you ask the AR if he wishes O'Leary waved him down he would have said yes. Granted, the crew was not getting another game as soon his flag went up and even if O'Leary somehow waved him down they still were going home. But the game would have been served right. I bet you if you ask Rosetti and his AR if they should have disallowed the goal in the Mexico Argentina game in '06 they would say yes. The game would have been served. Also, what was Nigeria gonna complain about? They would have known at halftime (probably earlier than that) just like Bosnia knew at halftime that the AR blew the call. Their complaints would have fallen on deaf ears like the Honduras' coach complaints after the France game.
Seriously? Who used the word "credentials?" You said it had never even been your "concern." If the topic at hand is a serious discussion of this call, then you're the one deflecting from it. Ah, the vaunted "handbook." I should have known it was in the handbook. Ok, it's time to work on your reading comprehension skills. "IT" didn't happen in the incident you're citing. What happened in that incident is the AR thought the player actually touched the ball, but he didn't. That's part of the teamwork stuff I was referring to in the above post. The AR is using the flag to tell the CR the player is in an offside position and he is actively involved in the play. The CR in the Brazilian case overrules him because he knows the player in question didn't touch the ball. As I said above, there are several situations where such an overruling occurs. But as I said above, and now for the third time, overruling offside position is not one of them. It's laughable that you can't distinguish between the two. Who said they were? But it's worth noting you did edit your post to include that clip after I had already responded. So saying I was trying to "dismiss the counter-examples" is rich. Mainly because, well... A) It didn't exist when I was responding, so there was nothing to dismiss B) It has nothing to do with what we're talking about, even though you like to think it does Your position is wrong. You have no concept of what that the landscape actually looks like from the CR's position (which is mind-boggling to me, but whatever). And it is completely unheard of at any serious level of play. CRs do not get involved in judging offside position.
The CR would never have seen the trail leg that makes it "obvious" onside. If anything, from his angle, he probably thought the player was off. That's the ARs call 100% of the time...Not 99.9999% Your example you provided shows a situation where the AR thought he saw a touch but didn't. The officiating team in the Mexico/Cameroon match made a mistake in which the CR should've been able, and willing, to "wave down" his AR, but again, that was a situation of not seeing who touched the ball.
Just to take things out of order and address this separately, the Rosetti call was potentially different because it was obvious the AR got confused with the goalkeeper out in front of two defenders. If Rosetti and his AR had figured it out together, before the replay was shown, great. There were a lot of pieces to that puzzle, so to speak. But the right result doesn't mean a great officiating decision. If a CR can just flatly overrule an AR on a straight-forward offside position that was probably about a 0.25 m decision... well, then that just means he can do the game himself. It undermines the whole concept of how officiating works. What would Nigeria have to complain about? Um, every single close offside decision the rest of the game--both on offense and defense; they'd be expecting or demanding an overrule the rest of the match. Maybe it's a semantic distinction that you don't see, but while it wouldn't be one of the worst officiating results of all time, because it would be correct (again, on pure dumb luck, fueled by arrogance), it still would have been one of the worst officiating decisions.
In the officiating circles/community it would have been a terrible decision in the sense that you're saying. O'Leary would have been blasted by his colleagues after the game. Would O'Leary have been blasted after the game by the media, coaches of Nigeria and the players? Would they have complained? Would they be saying "why is the AR there if you can overrule him there?" No he wouldn't and that's all that FIFA cares about. Busacca doesn't want to have questions about WRONG decisions. He doesn't care how it happens as long as it's right. It's pretty apparent from the way that this World Cup has been officiated that Busacca/FIFA has told the referees to referee the games to the public opinion approval. Show less cards, keep the players in the game and keep the coaches in the game. Don't make any borderline decisions in the affirmative. Have we seen any goal allowed in this World Cup that has been offside yet how many have we seen that has been on side but ruled out? FIFA doesn't want the officiating to be the story of the game and O'Leary and his AR are by getting the call wrong. If O'Leary somehow waved him down they would not be because the call was right. You think Busacca would be taking questions from the Nigerian press about referee protocol and responsibility?
As a US fan, I can't count the number of times I've seen Jozy Altidore called for a foul for trying the same "swim move" that Emenike used...
But O'Leary wouldn't have known that until he got shown a replay after the game. Making a decision that isn't your responsibility and that you don't know the facts for can never be a good decision