Match #34 Saudi Arabia : Egypt Monday, 25 June 2018 17:00 local time (10:00 EDT) Volgograd Referee: Wilmar Roldan (COL) AR1: Alexander Guzman (COL) AR2: Cristian de la Cruz (COL) Fourth Official: Ricardo Montero (CRC) Reserve AR: Hiroshi Yamauchi (JPN) Video Assistant Referee: Artur Dias Soares (POR) AVAR 1: Tiago Lopes Martins (POR) AVAR 2: Carlos Astroza (CHI) AVAR 3: Wilton Sampaio (BRA)
Surprised he gets a second game, but it is a meaningless match, so perhaps that is why he gets it. Message sent in a negative manner. PH
I'm obviously not watching this, but 3 fouls through 36 minutes (according to FIFA.com) is, well, different.
PK to KSA. Not as clear cut as the Korea one, but there's enough there to call it and certainly not enough to overturn it.
I'm going to need to see a video of that one, because that picture could tell a number of stories. The one that jumps into my head first says no way on a PK. But video could show something entirely different than what is in my mind.
2nd PK - Roldan gave a PK and VAR recommended an OFR. After spending about 45 seconds at the monitor, he stayed with the decision of a PK after deciding the pull on the arm came before the pull on the jersey. https://www.clippituser.tv/c/lnwmkb
INteresting. Holding has been inconsistent in the extreme, it seems to me. Not sure how they rein that in, but it seems that there's hugs and pulls on every set piece. If that standard prevailed, we could have several PKs each match for a while. Thoughts? The first PK seems to be arm out in an "unnatural position" (which always sounds vaguely puritanical to me) making himself bigger and blocking the cross thereby, so good PK?
Roldan obviously trying to show that he does know what a PK is after all, following his failure to give obvious PKs in the England-Tunisia match. Maybe he got a refresher course! PH
I don't love it. But certainly not anything for VR to overturn as clearly wrong. Falls right in the grey area. Some components say PK, others say no PK.
Fascinating. Again, I don't like that PK call there. If you see that correctly, I think you call nothing. Both were grabbing and the attacker certainly has not earned a PK when he's grabbing a handful of jersey and pulling his defender with him. But I also don't think there's enough to clearly overturn. I don't like the PK, but I can't say it's clearly wrong precisely because the defender is reaching out to hold the attacker. So I think you're left with having to let a "soft" PK call stand. Juxtapose this one against Brych in Serbia-Switzerland, which is the other one where you can say both players were committing fouls. Of course, in that one the defensive foul was far more egregious. But I think it shows why Brych likely would not have overturned his decision as clearly wrong and gone with a PK. The bar is that high. Surprised Dias Soares sent this down.
Actually, i'm guessing after this tournament, the question of whether PKs of this magnitude should be sent down is going to be much examined. I for one could see a lower bar to allow CRs to reconsider soft calls, or pretty borderline non-calls. Partly because it is a balance between accuracy and speed, and since people seem fairly ok with the stoppages, that relaxes the need to severely limit the number of reviews.
I think he should have reversed it. That was less than soft. Its also possible he was shielded in real time (it looks that way to me). The arms are entangled, a player passes in front of him, and now the forward is down in the box. I could see why he called it (he didn't have a clear view), why the VAR sent it down (he did have a clear view), but I can't see why R stayed with it, especially with the shirt pull in there. To me, that meets the clear and obvious standard. Its closer to the Neymar one than the Brych one. But hey. Roldan.