They were "suspended" until the all-star break. JAR was "demoted" or whatever, back to A-league, and never made a come-back. He actually wanted off the AR track, and onto the R track, and that didn't work. SAR finished the season, did a play-off game, and in fact I think even had a whistle (sort of, as it was for an injured referee). He retired after the season, but there was not only the 2 caution debacle, but also a terribly missed offside on the winning goal in the play-off game, and also a really bad miss in an international friendly in a sold-out stadium (VC off the ball, Argentina vs Mexico I think). Those three combined. Also, the referee did not throw them under the bus. (The truth is, AR 1 had the first caution, but couldn't tell on the second, AR2 had the second, but didn't have the first, the 4th wasn't clear headed enough to navigate that, and the R (who mis-recorded the first one) pretty much said, "screw it, we are not going to wait and around and sort this out").While he did not take their input, he owned that, and I know he has a bad rap, but throwing his crew under the bus in this incident should not be part of it. Finally, the 4th went on to do several MLS games in the middle (IIRC) and...well, he had some issues in those games too. All that to say, its just not true that this incident killed everyone's career (although that may be true for AR2).
Now with the benefit of a couple of days and the chance to watch the full replay, I gotta think this whole crew is suffering from a massive dose of "Referee Guilt". Hopefully they're able to bounce back, they are all referees who likely have lots of soccer left in them. And while I'm thinking about it, this phrase from the USL Statement on the matter kinda bothered me: "The USL and PRO will determine why this less than proficient application of the Laws of the Game arose with the match officials". I'm sure someone is trying to be cute with their communications, but I just felt like this was poor form by USL. No need to get cheeky with a situation like this. Never mind the bemusement over the refs being suspended indefinitely from USL, but the match results stand...m'kay.
Thanks for the clarification, albeit a bit misleading. True, but that was not until several years later. He was out for a while before making a comeback. Nobody said it killed everyone's career. Just that the rest of the crew got a lot of undeserved blame which had some additional ramifications. Overall not good at all. Clearly the referee went on to get on the FIFA list, the 4th did get a 2nd chance many years later and is now a National Assessor. And even AR2 eventually became a National Assessor and later an AR coach in PRO. PH
No, it just doesn't correspond with what you can see on video. After both relevant cautions, there are protests and/or a cut to replays. You can't see every conversation. Plus you only can see AR1 during any of this misconduct--we have no idea if the 4th and AR2 were talking or not. If you appear to be convinced there was no communication, then why did you ask? @socal lurker lays out pretty well how this would happen, even with constant communication. The first caution involved protests from the attacking team that needed to be addressed. If, by the time the caution was recorded and dictated into the comms, she got the wrong number and no one else was sure of it being someone else, once that caution is incorrectly documented by all four (or whichever of the four were recording) then there's no going back. You can communicate until the cows come home, but if you're all relying on the same bad information, you're doomed. I'm not. He's the only one you can see during the 2CT incident and within a few minutes afterward, he has a strange foul call and contradicts her on an SFP red card. I'm just pointing out what I can see and, perhaps, using that evidence to suggest that maybe he didn't follow instructions. As for the other two, we can't really judge without seeing/knowing what they were doing. This is true, 100%. The mistake was a critical one and a bad one and falls on the referee. But when something like this happens, it is worth asking why and figuring out why the safety mechanisms to prevent it didn't kick in.
USL's statement was a blatant lie and feeds into the anti-referee bias of fans. It was meant to highlight the culpability of the referees, pretend like the USL was taking action, and shift focus away from the decision or inability to replay the match. USL has no authority over the referees that work its league. Any discipline would come from USSF and/or PRO. All four officials are local. Two of them only work that club, so you'd suspect they won't work in the league until at least next year anyway. The one "traveling" AR actually only goes to Portland at the moment, so the same likely will apply to him. That leaves Koroleva, who worked as a VAR in MLS last night. So, you know, she hasn't been tossed overboard by PRO yet. She may be steered clear of USL for the rest of the year--no idea. But that's a PRO decision and not one that USL has any power to make.
I am not convinced one way or the other. That is why I asked. There did not appear to be any. I do find it hard to believe that all 4 officials got the wrong player number of the first YC. Besides, many good referees have a good recall of the few players who get YCs in a match regardless of any written record and keep this in active memory throughout the match. This is helpful to try to keep the player from getting into more trouble, by mentioning it if they next step out of line. Actually the body language of the player when he got the 2nd YC was the most telling. He clearly thought he was off. This should have also alerted at least one of the crew that something was wrong. Exactly! That is the entire point of my queries! Glad you agree after all. Many disasters (e.g Titanic, some airplane crashes etc.) are the result of several systems failures, not just one. BTW, I recalled two previous incidents of this type back in the old NASL days. One was by a referee who had been to the World Cup, and was near retirement, the other was by a referee early in his career, who later went to a World Cup! PH
one thing that i have not read that should be brought up as a learning lesson. Is the review of cautions at halftime. If this is done then everyone is on same page.. I remember a story a instructor told in Region 4 a while back where the ar1,ar2,4th and the assessor had a guy being cautioned and the referee had someone different. even both teams had the player being cautioned and in extra time the same player received a 2nd caution (or what should have been) and the referee did not show the 2nd yellow and then red.. Funny part of that story is the player even walked off and his coach had to send him back
Does she write down any caution at all? In the 75th minute caution she doesn't seem to take any note, at least several seconds after putting the card back into her pocket.
Since this thread continues to ask "what really happened," here's what I have heard. It is only 2nd hand, so more than a supposition but less than from the crew directly. I'm told that the first caution was misidentified by Kotcha over the communications system as going to #28. Apparently that number was duly noted by the rest of the crew, at least mentally. That was in the first half. It appears safe to assume that there was no confirmation of the player cautioned at halftime by the crew members. To be honest, a minor failure, normally. Then, in the second half, the incident we see on the video occurred. First, Kotcha was distracted by her major error of not looking for the possibility of advantage (remembering that the foul took place outside the penalty area, so the "there is no advantage in the penalty area" doctrine does not apply). It was a reckless foul and that can take your breath away, as a referee, at least a bit, and cause you to focus your attention too tightly on what just happened and not the bigger picture. Apparently, as a result, that loss of big picture focus caused her to not identify the player she was cautioning as the guy that she had cautioned in the first half. So, was she relying solely on shirt numbers to identify who was being cautioned or was she also mentally remembering the face of whom she had cautioned? So I see three lessons here: 1. double check cautioned players numbers at halftime with the other members of your crew, even if you don't have a 4O who is responsible to record cautions. 2. even on a cardable foul, don't get focused solely on the foul. Be calm enough to see the whole picture. 3. have a mental image of players you have carded, so you can manage their subsequent behavior, because they need more management, whether by voice or card. Perhaps you will want to add that the referee should record cautions and send offs, in addition to the 4O. Some do, some don't. Sandy apparently did. Kotcha didn't. And I'm 100% confident that Sandy and Kotcha have talked about what happened in this game.
This makes no sense. The first caution, in the first half, was the one where she arguably failed to apply advantage. Also, her name is "Katja."
Which is not really helpful if it's blatantly false. You referred to the incident "we see on video." That implies you watched it, right? How can you watch the video of the two cautions yourself and then repeat what you repeated? It's clearly untrue. Any issues with the application of advantage confusing the issue apply to the first half, not the second.
Yes to all three! [/QUOTE]Perhaps you will want to add that the referee should record cautions and send offs, in addition to the 4O. Some do, some don't.[/QUOTE] Perhaps???? This should be absolutely! Those that don't do this are playing with fire and are a screw-up waiting to happen just as we see here. The referee should always keep the record of the match. Do not trust others to do your job. I have no idea why some referees take this risk. There is no way in hell I and most of the top referees I am aware of would even think of doing this. Good old Murphy's Law applies here! I would hope any referee instructors/assessors/ coaches who read this would always advise referees to keep the match record. PH
Objection your honor, Hearsay! And I must admit, it sounds fishy anyway. Looking at the video, the four players right in the vicinity of the first caution were 27, 16, 25 and 2. Players 19 and 33 come into view a little later. 28 does not appear until much later. It is clear that he was not playing as a defender and is in fact listed as a forward on the line-up. Moreover 28 is African (Ghana) whereas 25 is larger in build and hispanic. Someone should have realized this misidentification. It just gets curiouser and curiouser (with apologies to Lewis Carroll). PH
Those lessons are all good for most games, especially those at a youth tournament when you are seeing teams and players for the first time. Not here to pile on you, just going to address the real lesson for the professional level. It is simply to know each player who is on the pitch. If you know the faces, names, and positions of all starters and substitutes before the match, you are likely not going to mis-identify a misconduct. Now, not saying the referee did not do this, but I find it hard to believe this kind of error could happen if she was familiar and comfortable with the identities of everyone on the pitch. With the amount of accessible game video and player information from league and team websites, it is rather easy, albeit tedious, work that pays great dividends during a game.
"but I find it hard to believe this kind of error could happen if she was familiar and comfortable with the identities of everyone on the pitch." Leaving aside some of the other points made in this thread, I have to correct this misconception that if Katya had studied all the players before the game this would not have happened - Graham Poll knew Josip Simunic of Croatia extremely well during WC Germany 2006 having refereed him several times at Club and International level, but he still made the horrendous mistake after which this thread is named. Knowledge of the players is important and should not be overlooked, but careful notation of all cautions - always by the Referee even if delegated to others as well - is the most important thing that must be done.
I don’t think it’s too much of a stretch to believe that the failed application of advantage in the first caution was a distraction enough to discombobulate the CR and cause her to misreport the number and/or fail to clearly remember the face of number 25. So just swap the order and it’s still quite plausible. The error and confusion still was created by the distraction of not giving advantage when she should have.
Right. I agree with that. So much so that I (and @socal lurker) have pretty much said that, along with the accompanying dissent, it is the most logical explanation for the origin of error since the very beginning of this thread. But "just swap[ing] the order" is a pretty big stipulation/mistake to correct when we're being told its the second-hand explanation from a member of the crew.
Sorry AP but your point is illogical. If she had studied the players, I would expect this mistake would not have happened. Poll's situation was entirely different. Poll knew the player and recorded his correct number. His mistake was to put the number under Australia, not Croatia, purportedly because Simunic, although playing for Croatia, was born and raised in Australia until he was 19 when he moved to Europe to play, and accordingly he spoke fluent English with an Aussie accent leading Poll to think he was booking an Australian player. Very unusual circumstances that would generally never happen. Please note that I am not making excuses for him, he clearly had a lack of concentration. Yes, still a mistake that should not happen, but not exactly the same as confusing an hispanic defender with a black Ghananian forward who was nowhere near the incident. I agree with this 100%! It seemed from the video that she showed the card and then put it back in the pocket without recording anything. I realize we did not see everything because the video then goes to several replays. PH
Look, the fundamental reason for the error was the referee not keeping an immediate record of the incident. All this other stuff, not giving advantage, opposing player complaints etc., is just irrelevant really. PH
Well, this does raise an interesting question or point, though. You and others have rightly pointed out the need for the referee and all officials to correctly record all misconduct. And I agree. But your use of the word "immediate" in this passage is new. Not saying it's wrong, just new. So the question becomes whether or not there situations, such as defusing continued conflict, managing dissent, hastening the treatment of an injury, etc., where the referee's attention needs to be elsewhere after the showing of a card but before he or she records the misconduct. I would argue that, yes, there are instances where other actions could take immediate priority. If you're saying otherwise and that the referee should always record misconduct immediately after showing a card, I'd be interested in hearing your reasoning.
If we all went back to old style or EPL Style handling of misconduct in this situation then none of this would happen. Bring them over record talk show
By immediate I meant at the time of the incident, not necessarily prior to dealing with other needs right then if there are any. But certainly record it before play is restarted and not later on at half-time or wharever. Of course if there are things like you mention going on, then by all means deal with them if needed. But in this situation under discussion, there was nothing really to deal with that would delay writing the number down while the card is out. She did not move from the spot and was not being seriously protested at. So there is not a good reason. PH
For better or worse, that's exactly how I deal with it. Show the card, write the number, deal with the rest. If they're insistent, I say "Let me write this down, then we'll talk." They almost always then patiently wait for me to finish writing before going back into their complaining. Most of the instances I can think of which would take priority over writing either also take priority over showing the card or are send offs, which are obviously easier on record keeping. Of course, my highest level is varsity so the needs of the professional game may dictate otherwise.
I think it’s hard to generalize because sometimes you isolate and record wile talking to the player, sometimes your running in with your card in the air and you have to defuse for a bit. In this case, timeliness of recording wasn’t exactly the issue: referee called a number that everyone recorded. Unfortunately, there was a 28 on the field, so even the 4O did not know from the roster it was an error. Even since everyone had the same number, the halftime reckoning would not have averted this outcome. Only the referee’s face awareness in the second half could have salvaged the first ID error. So, I guess another lesson is that 5s and 8s look similar so be extra sure when dealing with those numerals. Perhaps another is that each member of the ref team try to ID the player independently and THEN reach consensus rather than just accept what the center calls out. It does beg the question then why the match report didn’t have 28 as the first caution. I mean, no one else except the ref team has input, so how did they know about the error at all until after the game was complete?