I fell off posting the assignments due to travel, but back to post the QF assignments and also bumping this thread for possible discussion on who gets the final. Norway-England Referee: Lucila VENEGAS (MEX) AR 1: Mayte CHAVEZ (MEX) AR 2: Enedina CAUDILLO (MEX) 4O: Katalin KULCSAR (HUN) VAR: Massimiliano IRRATI (ITA) Italy-Netherlands Ref: Claudia UMPIERREZ (URU) AR 1: Luciana MASCARANA (URU) AR 2: Monica AMBOYA (ECU) 4O: Liang QIN (CHN) Germany-Sweden Ref: Stéphanie FRAPPART (FRA) AR 1: Manuela NICOLOSI (FRA) AR 2: Michelle O’NEILL (IRL) 4O: Melissa BORJAS (HON) France-USA Ref: Kateryna MONZUL (UKR) AR1: Maryna STRILETSKA (UKR) AR 2: Oleksandra ARDASHEVA (UKR) 4O: Kate JACEWICZ (AUS) VAR: Danny MAKKELIE (NED) For discussion of who gets the final, below is the list of the referees that have been asked to stay for the rest of the knockouts. The rest have been sent home. (Steinhaus was sent home as she is injured.) JACEWICZ Kate ALVES BATISTA Edina BEAUDOIN Marie-Soleil QIN Liang FRAPPART Stephanie BORJAS Melissa KULCSAR Katalin VENEGAS Lucila PUSTOVOITOVA Anastasia MONZUL Kateryna UMPIERREZ Claudia
If she doesn't screw up in the QF match, I think Umpierrez gets the final. If the US doesn't make it, and its an all-European final, I think it'll go to Monzul or Kulcsar. But Monzul had the last final, so I don't know if they'd give her a second. I think Pustovoitova will get one of the semi's and the other will go to one of the CONCACAF refs (Beaudoin?). Also I'm frequently wrong on predictions. Also with the US possibly not making the final, I think its really unfortunate that Chenard was not able to make this WWC since she surely had a good shot at the final. (Her cancer is terrible in any case, but the timing of it is also unfortunate for her refereeing career.) But Seitz also faced the same issue of being from the same federation as the team that almost always made the final.
My hesitation on Frappart is first that she's from France (so can't do the game if France is in it) and also it is quite unusual to get the final without first having another knockout round game, at least in a tournament where there is a Round of 16 and quarterfinal stage (so the "rule" has held true for the 2015 WWC and holds true for the MWC). When there was no Round of 16, the referee that got the final sometimes also had a quarterfinal game, but sometimes was held out for the final. But I could see her being used for an all-UEFA, France-less semifinal. Watch me be wrong in this case though...
I've always quite liked Lucila Venegas, although I am aware she's not very high-profile: she directed a lot at international youth level, but I guess an Olympic semifinal was her best achievement so far. Of course, same confederation issues would prevent her from refereeing a semifinal or final match with USA involved, but France should take care of that today.
A CONCACAF referee, such as Venegas or Beaudoin, could get the third place game though. Since the USA will be in the final...
With quarters done, I'm going to say Frappart now has a real shot at the final, which would be a nice nod to the host country, but I'd still love to see Umpierrez as I think she's earned it.
USA-England semifinal: Referee: Edina ALVES BATISTA (BRA) AR 1: Neuza BACK (BRA) AR 2: Tatiane SACILOTTI (BRA) 4O: Melissa BORJAS (HON) Wow! I wasn't expecting that one.
I guess her last match had been Italy-China? Her direction had left me quite unimpressed in that one.
I hate this appointment. Yet I think it'll probably work out alright. Alves Batista's foul recognition on minor things - what's a foul/what's incidental contact/what's falling down from simply being off-balance - is very good. What she was very bad at - dealing with negative, cynical play from a negative, cynical team like China - is unlikely to be a problem with the four remaining teams. I had a lot to say about it in the Referee Forum. I won't repeat it all here but if anyone wants to weigh in here rather than in the Ref Forum, I'm curious about what others think.
2nd semifinal: Netherlands-Sweden Ref: Marie-Soleil BEAUDOIN (CAN) AR 1: Princess BROWN (JAM) AR 2: Stephanie YEE SING (JAM) 4O: Kateryna MONZUL (UKR) Yay! I got one of the semis right!
Another referee who officiated a China match! At the time I was somewhat critical of Beaudoin for not adequately dealing with China's cynical play but I noted the difficulty of her position. She must've felt she was doing enough. She handed out FOUR yellow cards to China, whereas Alves Batista handed out ONE, in TWO MATCHES no less.
(Taking this over to the ref thread) It's interesting to me how different the application of VAR has been here in France this year versus over in Russia last year... I think someone may have posted already, (maybe over in the ref forum which I haven't checked,) but I'd be interested to see what, if any, differences there were in the instructions given to the WWC refs versus the MWC refs on when and how to use VAR. I certainly don't remember seeing stoppages this long, this frequent, and this minutiae-able last year. After last year, I liked VAR; this year, it's certainly a bit more abrasive.
In France men ref's in VAR room have almost no experience with women's game (3rd women ref have exp. but her job is to check offsides mostly) and women ref's on the pitch have little experience with VAR. In Russia ref's in VAR room and those on the pitch had lots of experience working together as well as with VAR tool. Other thing is that in Russia referees didn't use VAR as often.... or rather waived the VAR help trusting their own calls more.
3rd place game: England-Sweden R: Anastasia PUSTOVOYTOVA (RUS) AR 1: Ekaterina KUROCHKINA (RUS) AR 2: Petruta IUGULESCU (ROU) 4O: Kate JACEWICZ (AUS) VAR: Felix ZWAYER (GER) I thought she would one of the semis, and instead they held her for the 3rd place game, which is interesting. Deserved assignment, but still interesting.
She has done some Serie B matches and recently did at least one Serie A match in Brazil. She's also reffed international women's games. Also interestingly, Alves Batista was first a FIFA Assistant Referee, and then decided she wanted to switch and become a referee. So she's done both paths, which is very unusual.
Final: Ref: Stéphanie FRAPPART (FRA) ARef 1: Manuela NICOLOSI (FRA) ARef 2: Michelle O’NEILL (IRL) 4th. Off: Claudia UMPIERREZ (URU) VAR: Carlos DEL CERRO (ESP) Those who called Frappart got it right! A nice nod to the host country, and Umpierrez gets the 4th.
2019 WWC refereeing stats: Referee who did the most matches as a center: 3 referees tied with 4 matches apiece: Frappart, Alves Batista, and Beaudoin Number of YC's awarded: 128 (average of 2.46 per game) Number of RC's awarded: 1 directly, 2 more were from a 2nd caution Highest number of fouls called in a game: 39 in Australia-Italy group stage match (SF of Netherlands-Sweden was a close runner-up with 38) Lowest number of fouls called in a game: 10 in the USA-Thailand group stage match Avg. number of fouls called in a game: 20.5
For those of you nostalgic for those PK / VAR reviews... Dying at this penalty attempt pic.twitter.com/w08QX6hGRI— CJ Fogler account may or may not be notable (@cjzero) July 21, 2019 Since GK came off his line, this should be retaken. And in the World Cup, of course, the GK would've received an automatic yellow card. It's not like FIFA and the old men at IFAB are ruining the game. Oh, no, not at all.
These never got posted: FIFA's refereeing stats are much more involved than mine, including lots of stats on VAR: https://img.fifa.com/image/upload/zeghumlzve8t7pppcw8m.pdf The big stats for VAR: 535 checks, 33 reviews, and correct decisions increased from 93% to 98.5%. 58 seconds was the average time delayed by VAR (checks and reviews).
8 final decissions made wrong (including at least 2 penalty kicks - from quick look at stats). One would think it not so bad - that is only1,5% of all 535 incidents checked...unless you look at them individually: Wrong PK call that closed the door to advance for Japan (vs. Netherlands). Wrong PK call on Korea (vs. Norway the 2nd one) affected the final score and probably Australia (vs. Norway) handball and foul no-calls which should be called in favor of the Matildas
Collina gave a talk alongside Seitz at the conference on Sunday outlining preparation etc... no questions from the crowd unlike the one in June when journos attacked most of the decision in the tournament lol