09/16/20 FC Dallas vs Colorado Rapids Toyota Stadium (8:30PM ET) REF: Ismail Elfath AR1: Corey Parker AR2: Cory Richardson 4TH: Matt Thompson VAR: Kevin Terry Jr AVAR: Jennifer Garner San Jose Earthquakes vs Portland Timbers Earthquakes Stadium (9:30PM ET) REF: Alex Chilowicz AR1: TJ Zablocki AR2: Diego Blas 4TH: Michael Radchuk VAR: Fotis Bazakos AVAR: Mike Kampmeinert Vancouver Whitecaps vs Montreal Impact BC Place (9:30PM ET) REF: Drew Fischer AR1: Micheal Barwegen AR2: Chantal Boudreau 4TH: Alain Ruch VAR: Dave Gantar AVAR: Rene Parra
San Jose : Portland This game should not be played. The field is too dangerous. Someone is going to get hurt. Shame on MLS.
I missed the explanation for why the grass is so soft. Hasn't it been super dry in SJ? Did they over water it?
If anything, the smoke should have dried out the grass. They always overwater it, and apparently the water table is high in that location. Has the league ever stepped in and deemed a pitch too dangerous?
Avaya Stadium has struggled with the grass quality since it was built. Which is odd, because there's no reason they shouldn't be able to grow good grass there. That said, the field was FAR from unplayable, and the players didn't really seem to have any trouble with it. Anyway, notable VAR decision to give San Jose its goal. I think they got it right, but I'm not 100% sure it's "clear and obvious", given the camera angle. We all know that just seeing green between the ball and the goal line isn't definitive when you're dealing with a spherical ball. If MLS isn't going to use goal line tech, they really should have cameras on the goal line for making goal line decisions. Also, interesting mechanics on the VAR review--Chilowicz ran over to the monitor, looked at it for literally about one second, and then left to signal for the goal. I'm sure he was mostly just trusting his VAR, but it looked a little silly, given it really is a pretty close call.
Two players were injured from the pitch and a goal was almost scored when the pitch came out from under a defender. we can differ as to unplayable, but the players definitely had trouble with it.
I haven't seen which angle was used yet, but I'm sure you know there are other angles than the one you posted. If Chilowicz really took one second, I would posit that means there is an angle that shows this was conclusively an easy call to award the goal. Particularly since MLS and PRO just went over this on the NYRB situation. Believe me, MLS CRs to not just "trust" their VAR. I mean, they do. But not to the point of just accepting the call without any oversight. PRO has made it very clear that that's now how they want this to work. And it hasn't, as the number of OFRs resulting in unchanged calls demonstrates.
Based on the image on the VAR screen that Chilowicz was shown that we could see on the TV, it looked basically the same as the image @sjquakes08 posted. No other angles shown.
Well, that would be problematic. Maybe more than problematic given what PRO just went through on this very topic.
Here's two crude screenshots from a twitter highlight video that I believe are closer to the actual frame that the VAR would have used to call this a goal.
I'm going to wait to reserve judgment. If that was the only angle looked at by the referee, then I think this could be a problem. But remember the VAR is looking at 20+ cameras and then is sending down the best one or two. In this situation, the above camera coupled with another camera (demonstrating exactly where the defender's leg is relative to the line, could be more than enough. So I hope two angles were sent down. But if it was as quick as being said, maybe not. So I'd be interested in hearing the explanation.
Here's how quick it was: After the quickest VAR check of all time, the @SJEarthquakes are back level vs Portland 😅 pic.twitter.com/xG9Tiqh4rQ— FOX Soccer (@FOXSoccer) September 17, 2020 Literally half a second.
They can split screen it, but they're only supposed to do that in particular cases where the referee needs information that isn't available from one angle alone (think offside). For this, one angle at a time is appropriate because the referee only needs to see the location of the ball. Anyway, this I would imagine was a decision the referee was expecting to make. As fast as this all went down, there had to be a strong suspicion on the field that the ball had crossed the line, but the AR was either blocked or wasn't confident enough from his angle to give it. It still looks far too fast, and I don't think PRO will approve of the optics. That said, based on the screens from the broadcast posted above, that's a goal. There's enough green space to confidently give that, even from that angle IMO. It helps that this camera is placed a bit higher than the one at Red Bull Arena, if I'm not mistaken.
I’m not totally convinced It’s the correct call and I definitely think this is problematic given recent instruction. But if you’re actually talking about selling the call on the field, it probably doesn’t get any better than that. Because all 22 players on the field now think it was so obvious that he barely even needed to look. Of course, the problem is that it wasn’t that obvious.
It looked like a goal in real time (of course, camera angle), the announcers called it a goal (their camera angle), and I'm assuming that the VAR crew was telling the CR that it was indisputably a goal. I didn't see objections from Portland. Still, why Chilowicz didn't pause another second, I have no idea. His other significant miss was not calling advantage when a Quakes player was fouled.
I haven't watched this particular play on the replay yet, but don't ESPN and FS1 broadcasts have the "Target goal cam"? If that's the case, I just have to think someone saw that camera angle and could definitively see the ball completely cross the line. IF VAR had the goal cam angle and didn't send that one to the center, what the heck is VAR doing? (Of course, I say that not knowing exactly what was reviewed in the VOR. I'm just speculating.) I know angles and optics, but the freeze frame sure makes it look like a goal. But as others have said, take more than a couple of seconds to actually watch the definitive angle. Even if the correct call was ultimately made, this really just looks like a "well, we checked the monitor - what else do you want us to do??" type of exercise.
I suppose it also takes us back to the subjective vs. objective decisions and what the role of OFR should be. The VAR is in the comfort of a booth, easily able to look at all the angles multiple times. Does it really make sense, when determining if a ball crossed the line, to hav the VAR do that, come to the conclusion it did, and then expect the R to do the same thing all over again? Doesn't make sense to me, and I believe the MLS is the only place in the world that the R would even do an OFR on this, isn't it?
09/18/20 Seattle Sounders vs Los Angeles FC CenturyLink Field (10PM ET) REF: Joe Dickerson AR1: Cameron Blanchard AR2: Mike Rottersman 4TH: Brad Jensen VAR: Tim Ford AVAR: Joshua Patlak
Just the ESPN broadcasts have the goal camera. The only reason FS1 broadcasts had it during the MLS Is Back tournament is because ESPN handled on-site production duties and setup all the cameras. The angle that was visible on the monitor that the referee reviewed on the broadcast was the standard top-of-the-penalty area angle — the same one that the freeze frames earlier in the thread are from.
Bob Bradley had a whine about the second penalty called against his team in Seattle. "Overall I thought the start to the game was fair enough. And two penalties. The first one we just don't do well enough in terms of dealing with the ball as it comes in. On the second one, for me, it's just not a penalty. Pablo's [Sisniega] coming to take the ball. And so I don't think that that's one that you'll see called on too often in big games." https://www.mlssoccer.com/post/2020...troversial-penalty-call-loss-seattle-sounders
He's not wrong. The second just isn't a penalty at any competitive level of soccer. If it is a better ball where the attacker has a chance to actually get it, you can make a better case.