2018 MLS Week 30 Referee Discussion

This may have been mentioned earlier in the season but...

What happened to Juan Guzman?

 

Fitness/injury, and I believe he was involved in more than one high-profile VAR mistake early in the season.

 

Oh man, nightmare VAR scenario in San Jose tonight as a Wondo goal is scrubbed off due to a handling offense in the opposite penalty area. What would have been 4-1 became 3-2 after the made penalty. Atlanta went on to win 3-4.

Now, this may well have been unavoidable on the part of the VAR. Apparently 33 seconds passed from the moment of the handling to the goal being scored by Wondo. However, there was some time after the goal before the review was recommended.

 

Unfortunate that that happened in San Jose, but I'm really not sure what the alternative is. Do fans want the referee to have the ability to stop a counter-attack to go review a play that might have been a handball? Probably not. So the only time to review is the next stoppage.

It does bring up a question of whether it might make sense for a referee to stop play in the case of a very clear and obvious miss (and the ball in a neutral position), if instructed by the VAR. What if the ball doesn't go out of play for 5 minutes?

 

I believe it was more like 1.5 minutes passed. I don't know the statute of limitation on these things, but my guess is that the rules need to be updated to allow stoppage of play depending on the severity of the issue.

 

The protocols for VAR allow the referee to stop play for a review when the ball is in a neutral area (like near midfield) and neither team has a particular attacking advantage. That never happened in this clip, so the use of VAR was correct (per the current instructions). It also wasn't anywhere near 1.5 minutes despite what the broadcast said.

65:32 - Deliberate handling occurs in San Jose penalty area. Atlanta maintains possession and continues to attack.
65:50 - Atlanta loses possession about 18 seconds later and the counter-attack immediately begins.
66:04 - Ball hits the back of the net on the other end. Only 32 seconds elapsed from the handling offence to the goal being scored. There was never a situation where the ball was in a neutral area with neither team having a particular advantage. This counter attack was direct.

Basically, there was no opportunity to stop the match to get this review in because if the referee stops it during that counterattack and it was determined to NOT be a clear and obvious error, now we've denied San Jose what would have been a good goal. So while this is one of those not ideal situations for VAR, this is exactly the way it was supposed to work.

Note a few other things... the commentators are not in the stadium, so they have no idea what's going on on the field except what the main broadcast angle is telling them. The first clue this is being reviewed is at 66:55 when you see the 4th official preventing the substitution to proceed until it gets checked. And at 67:19, Bazakos is shown already at the monitor (which is the first time the broadcast is even aware it's under review). They assume it is for potential offside and remain confused for minutes more. Definitely some communication issues to sort out, still.

 

I was watching in stadium, so was completely confused (another opportunity for both the ref crew and the stadium announcers to get on the same page). It felt like longer, but it was all so confusing, I'm not sure what I was thinking at the time.

Still would like to see the VAR lead to able to halt the game for certain completely game changing situations (like a PK).

 

I find it ironic these clowns on Univision spent 30 minutes ripping on both the referees (who did nothing wrong other than the obvious of missing the PK to begin with) and the VAR system when most of their confusion comes from the cheapness of their own company not flying them out to the game.

I also found it strange as to how confused they were. I never even noticed the handling during live play if not for their mentioning it. And yet, once the video review started they were both too stupid to consider that it had nothing to do with the SJ goal or offside. On top of that, at some point the producer should've also realized what was going on seeing as their own commentators had mentioned a potential handling for a PK. Can the producer not hear his own people? Stop replaying the SJ goal and trying to figure out if it's offside. Complete amateur hour from the commentators and producers. We don't need to make excuses for them being confused just because they aren't in the stadium since they clearly noticed a potential missed PK and brought it up right after it happened. They're just dumb. Even after the game was over they had still yet to show a good angle of the PK which I am sure was even more infuriating if you're a SJ fan.

Also thanks for doing the time analysis as they kept insisting it was one minute forty seconds. They must've said that 50 times before the game was over. Clearly there was never time for the referee to consider stopping dynamic play in this situation.

Next time Univision has a game I want to watch I'll just set up my bluetooth speaker in front of my TV and listen to the radio feed instead.

 

Also worth noting is that this problem is not unique to VAR in soccer. It's happened in the NHL as well, where the next stoppage after a missed goal was the other team scoring. I've also seen the next stoppage after a missed goal being another goal by the same team (by the same player!).

In very rare instances in the NHL, if play goes on long enough after a missed goal that the centralized review room in Toronto can determine that a goal was scored, they will instruct the timekeeper to sound the horn and stop play.

(Another interesting NHL tidbit: if a goal is missed and play continues, and a player subsequently commits a penalty before the play is reviewed, the player still has to serve his penalty even if they go back and award the goal).

 

Were you at the game?

 

From what I’ve been told (and understand), either the local AVAR or someone else in the video review room in the stadium posts into a Slack channel details about the review. This Slack channel is available to stadium announcers and the television crews (and maybe the press?). First, they post that play is being reviewed and for which of the 4 reviewable incidents it is being reviewed. Then, after review, they post the decision and the definitive angle used. For example, “left goal line angle” or similar.

Now, all this is second hand from people who’ve been involved. I don’t know that this is still the process, if it’s followed consistently, or even if anyone on the broadcasts (remote or in stadium) bother to monitor this at all.

 

As far as I know, that's how it's supposed to work

 

JC Rivero had DC United vs Olympia (Hon) friendly this week. Interesting situations: there was a DC player who kept going down with leg cramps, then getting up when the game was stopped. The second time this happened, Olympia just stopped playing with the ball at midfield. Rivero had to whistle the play dead, then restarted with a drop ball, which DC kicked all the way back to the Olympian keeper. Rivero killed the play, redid the drop ball, and gave it to Olympia back at midfield (to keep them from loosing 60 yards). I hadn't seen that since Pertrescu did that a few years ago, and was roundly rebuked for it.
Then, the third time that player went down, Rivero kept him off the field for probably 3 minutes (it felt like forever), despite the player and the trainers yelling and waving and freaking out from the sideline. JAR (Morgante) just shrugged his shoulders to the trainers, clearly communicating, "Hey, don't blame me, its your guy who keeps time wasting."
Not sure if it was a real match if Rivero would have done either of those moves.

 

That's some bush league shit for a damn friendly, but yeah, I doubt he'd take so much direct control over sportsmanship in a competitive match. But for a friendly no one's watching or cares about? Hell yeah.

 

All 3 major incidents in CLB-COL so far have been interesting.

CLB goal: Possible offside on the player coming back but he may not have touched the ball. Still looked like he tried to play it.

COL goal: CLB is clearly expecting a ceremonial restart but COL realizes it hasn't been given

COL red: Seems really soft

And as I type this CLB scores a second, so there are now 4 major incidents in the game but CLB's 2nd seemed pretty straight forward.

 

Don't see anything wrong with the Colorado goal. Chapman is hanging back away from the Colorado players. There's no indication that he's involved himself in the restart. Columbus just assumed there would be a whistle because of the location. Oops.

 

Hi, I had an offside question about the Union's second goal vs. SKC yesterday. Simpson is in an offside position when the ball is crossed in, but is not involved in the play, so no whistle, correctly. Bedoya beats the offside trap, heads the ball back to Simpson (both of them beyond the defenders) and he scores. Here's the clip.

https://streamable.com/6nxhx

I thought part of the offside rule was gaining an advantage by being in an offside position. I understand it's a new phase of play once Bedoya touches the ball, and Simpson is behind him for that phase, but Simpson's position is so good because it was offside in the previous phase. Nothing wrong with that?

 

Offside position is determined at the moment a teammate last touches the ball. When Bedoya heads the ball, Simpson is now onside. The gaining an advantage clause applies to a rebound from a post, crossbar or from a defender (most often the GK) making a deliberate save.

 

The Bradley Wright Phillips blow-up over his yellow card for dissent had me wondering about the claims that were made.

Here is Kevin Stott's response to a question about the card:
“He disputed that there was a foul that was not called that he suffered,” Stott said in a written statement. “Multiple use of the word “F—“ directed at the assistant referee in an aggressive manner.”

The defense is that players do that and worse all the time and don't get carded. I know that MLS refs put up with a lot that lower refs would never stand for, but is there any truth to the claim that f-bombs directed at officials are frequently ignored?

Most of us lower level refs are giving a red on that one, but we referee completely different games.

I also understand there is much more to the protest, it put BWP over the limit on yellow cards, so he misses the next game vs Atlanta and there is a general feeling from the Red Bulls that he doesn't get any respect or calls from refs, and so on.

But my question remains, is throwing F-bombs at refs ever ok in the MLS?


https://www.prosoccerusa.com/mls/re...phillips-lashes-out-after-costly-yellow-card/

 

Thanks, makes sense. Guess it could be a real can of worms if defined any other way.

 

Keep in mind that in the WC there were at least two examples of players screaming F you at refs from close up (clear with even rudimentary lip reading)--at least one of which was in reaction to a caution. Neither got any reaction from the ref.

I'm not condoning this, but it is pretty clear that tolerance at the professional level is much higher than anything I would even remotely consider passing on.

In the game, I suspect the caution had more to do with the "aggressive manner" than the players choice of words.

 

I should also point out that you could apparently hear what was said quite well from the stands nearby. Public and provocative.