The assignments for Week 17 of the 2018 Major League Soccer season: 06/23/2018 Philadelphia Union v Vancouver Whitecaps Talen Energy Stadium (5PM ET) REF: ALLEN CHAPMAN AR1: JEREMY HANSON AR2: JEREMY KIESO 4TH: KEVIN BROADLEY VAR: JORGE GONZALEZ New York Red Bulls v FC Dallas Red Bull Arena (6PM ET) REF: ROBERT SIBIGA AR1: CJ MORGANTE AR2: IAN ANDERSON 4TH: SORIN STOICA VAR: DAVE GANTAR Orlando City v Montreal Impact Orlando City Stadium (7:30PM ET) REF: DREW FISCHER AR1: GIANNI FACCHINI AR2: EDUARDO MARISCAL 4TH: ELVIS OSMANOVIC VAR: DAVID BARRIE Sporting Kansas City v Houston Dynamo Children’s Mercy Park (8:30PM ET) REF: ALAN KELLY AR1: LOGAN BROWN AR2: BRIAN DUNN 4TH: NIMA SAGHAFI VAR: JON FREEMON Colorado Rapids v Minnesota United Dick’s Sporting Goods Park (9PM ET) REF: CHICO GRAJEDA AR1: APOLINAR MARISCAL AR2: MICHAEL KAMPMEINERT 4TH: ISMIR PEKMIC VAR: VICTOR RIVAS Real Salt Lake v San Jose Earthquakes Rio Tinto Stadium (10PM ET) REF: SILVIU PETRESCU AR1: PETER MANIKOWSKI AR2: CHRIS WATTAM 4TH: JOSEPH DICKERSON VAR: LUIS GUARDIA Seattle Sounders v Chicago Fire CenturyLink Field (10PM ET) REF: ARMANDO VILLARREAL AR1: KYLE ATKINS AR2: JEFFREY GREESON 4TH: ALEJANDRO MARISCAL VAR: KEVIN TERRY JR. Los Angeles FC v Columbus Crew Banc of California Stadium (10:30PM ET) REF: KEVIN STOTT AR1: ADAM GARNER AR2: FELISHA MARISCAL 4TH: BALDOMERO TOLEDO VAR: ALEX CHILOWICZ 06/24/2018 Atlanta United v Portland Timbers Mercedes-Benz Stadium (4:30PM ET) REF: JOSE CARLOS RIVERO AR1: ADAM WIENCKOWSKI AR2: BRIAN POESCHEL 4TH: MARCOS DEOLIVEIRA VAR: GEOFF GAMBLE New York City v Toronto FC Yankee Stadium (5PM ET) REF: ISMAIL ELFATH AR1: KATHRYN NESBITT AR2: NICK URANGA 4TH: SORIN STOICA VAR: JORGE GONZALEZ Pekmic with his second 4th, Osmanovic and Broadley also return to the 4O position.
Right on cue in the Philly-Vancouver game: a Caps defender pulls the shoulder of an Union attacker, throwing him off stride and causing him to miss-kick his shot, and the announcer says "that was much less than what wasn't given in the Sweden-Germany game."
Wow that NYRB tackle is probably the worst in MLS this season. I'm surprised Sibiga needed VAR to make that SFP.
After two rounds of matches in the World Cup, I'm convinced that VAR is just so much better there than in the MLS. In the MLS the referees are missing (refusing to sanction in real time) things that should obviously be dealt with and were not difficult to see in real time--no obstructed view, really no controversy. But they wait and then have an OFR and then deal with it. Here, VAR isn't helping referees avoid big mistakes (like in the WC), but rather is justifying them not acting on big calls. I think there are two main reasons: 1. The lower threshold for VAR involvement 2. The assessment criteria where if a referee misses something in real time he is dinged, but if he catches it on VAR the ding goes away. That leads to what we have here. The slap to the face in Geiger's game, this tackle here, the PK in Rivero's game last week, the cleat to the chest in Chico's game a few weeks ago...the referee is not dinged for missing those things because, hey, VAR caught them. The result--lamer soccer.
I guess I'm just not drawing the same conclusion as you. There have been some missed SFPs that could have easily been dealt with on the field in MLS, sure. And maybe the presence of VR has played a role in that. I'll give you that. But here are my conclusions: 1) MLS & PRO have determined VR is supposed to catch and punish all VC misconduct. The Geiger slap, the Stott double-red, several more instances of hands to the face. Etc., etc. Thus far, FIFA has shown zero inclination of punishing VC rigidly via video. There was one slap sent down and given as yellow. One slap in CRC-SRB totally missed. Marcelo's hands-to-the-face. The Croatian kick of the ball into the Argentinian player's head. There have been four clear instances of VC that FIFA VARs have not sent down as clearly wrong, while I have no doubt that all four of them would have gotten red in MLS. So which standard is correct? If VR is there to punish missed instances of VC, I would think PRO/MLS. But FIFA doesn't want that many red cards so we get what we get. 2) FIFA has had a bunch of non-penalty calls changed to penalties (but not on aerial challenges, of course). PRO/MLS have had a higher bar for this. I guess this one is in the eye of the beholder, but it seems PRO/MLS has taken the position that most penalty decisions are defensible either way and they don't want MLS having too sharp of an uptick in penalties and changing the nature of the game. FIFA has taken the opposite approach. 3) PRO/MLS have shown little hesitation in overturning goals for fouls in the APP. It hasn't happened yet at the World Cup and there were two clear opportunities (Portugal/Spain & Switzerland/Brazil) where the standard would have been met in MLS. 4) Quite simply, there tend to be fewer SFP tackles in a World Cup than in domestic league play. So although your original point is somewhat correct, other than the De Bruyne challenge and the two challenges in Croatia-Argentina, we don't have much to compare SFP to. There have been no clear SFP tackles in the World Cup that referees have missed, so while you might fault Sibiga or claim he was relying on VAR subconsciously, there is no comparable incident in this World Cup yet. From a skill standpoint, of course MLS is inferior to the World Cup. But from an excitement/entertainment standpoint, I actually think the style of officiating and the way VAR has been used at the World Cup has resulted in "lamer soccer" because of what gets encouraged and what gets rewarded. But to each their own, of course.
I was told that last year during PRO assessments the referee was being assessed as if VAR was not there, so a missed VC RC that was not whistled would be marked down appropriately, with a note stating that VAR resolved the siutation correctly. I'm not sure if that style of assessment has continued or not.
That's not really it. If you get an "expected correct" KMI wrong, you lose 3 points, as you always have. If you then correct your decision with the help of the VAR, you get a point back. So it's -2 instead of -3. If you get a difficult KMI wrong, you lose 1 point. If VAR corrects it, you get that point back for a net of zero. So the VR system is saving referees from losing any points on difficult KMIs if the decision is ultimately correct. But it's only marginally helping on "expected correct" KMIs. The inherently interesting part of this scoring system--when you compare what's going on to the World Cup--is that PRO believes "difficult KMIs" should be corrected if they can be proven to be clearly wrong. I find it hard to believe that FIFA is taking the same approach, given what we're seeing in Russia.
This is a great synopsis and analysis of VAR use to date in the World Cup. My impression is that fans feel MUCH better about VAR in WC than in MLS. I'm undecided to what extent those feelings are due to the apparently greater efficiency/speed of the video review process in Russia (due to greater resources in the booth, more camera angles, considering a smaller set of incident types, etc) and/or simply that the types of decisions being scrutinized and changed (or not) are the types of things that the fans want to see considered and changed (or not). I'm not hearing outrage or frustration from neutral fans about the 'misses' from the WC regarding violent conduct, for example. It feels like people don't want those types of red cards being piled on and 'affecting matches.' It also seems that the IFAB protocols and guidelines for VAR may be being followed more loosely in the World Cup than in MLS.