https://www.streambug.io/cv/234dc5 This, by the way, is how Taylor ends up doing games that have thirteen cautions or whatever - he only gives cards when the temperature of the game is rising and doesn't aim to have a clear and consistent line from the start which would prevent the temperature from getting (so) high in the first place.
100%. "Like how dare you have the temerity to ask me to do my job." The worst part is he and others genuinely don't think he is doing anything wrong. The worst. Easy yellow card that he has seen 1000s of times in his career, but won't give it because it's 8 minutes into a game. Just awful.
And yet again I ask myself why people want to use "personality" to avoid giving deserved cards And think about how referees never regret giving cards, but frequently regret not giving a card, or waiting too long to give one. Give the deserved cards early to hopefully prevent games from getting out of hand. I just don't get it.
Tons of atrocious tackles in Spurs-Villa. One really should’ve been cautioned, and maybe that would’ve nipped things in the bud, but the cards have since come out, and it’s a bit better now.
And the VAR inexplicably fails to recommend an OFR for Martinez' very late studs-to-the-knee challenge on Palmer. The only potential argument I could see being made as to that being yellow, not red, is that Palmer's leg was bent and therefore his knee was closer to the ground than a knee would normally be, but given how late and reckless the tackle was, the VAR at least has to ask the CR to go decide for himself at the monitor.
I’m wearing red tinted glasses and my immediate reaction was “Martinez is a lucky boy and that’s SFP”.
No, he doesn’t. The referee already did decide himself. I’m loathe to defend English officiating. And having not yet seen the incident, for all I know it’s a clear red. But this standard is just a myth that will not die. There’s no “eh this is borderline go have another look.” The VAR either has a clear unambiguous red, in which case a review is recommended. Or he doesn’t, in which case call stands. It’s easy enough to critique EPL referees without complaining about a non-existent standard.
I am going to proactively disagree with the panel's rulings that these two incidents aren't clear SFPs. Southampton-Leicester (Madley): https://www.streambug.io/cv/af0933 ManUtd-Chelsea (Jones): https://www.streambug.io/cv/5f2e6f
I think the Jones was is blood red. Like, he’s not even challenging for the ball at that point. What are we doing? Madley’s seems to fall into the expected yellow card range—certainly in England. Lot of intensity but it’s on the floor the whole time. I understand the SFP arguments. But I don’t think they are all clear cut.
I think it's pretty clear by now that refs in England are being trained instructed to avoid giving RC's for SFP if at all possible. I don't remember the article or website, but data was published not too long ago that shows that far fewer RC's were handed out in England than in any other major European league or the UCL/Europa/Conference Leagues.
I'm a Liverpool supporter, but I just don't think they're going to be giving a straight red without more force than what Martinez does there. I feel like it we went through a lot of SFP examples, they'd have more force than this... Curtis Jones v Spurs last season springs immediately to mind. Seems like it's going to be judged more harshly if it's in Europe, or in an international competition.
It’s unbelievable that this many years in, people still don’t understand VAR. If the VAR doesn’t recommend a review, it means you now have two different referees who have come to the same conclusion. What is the reason to send a CR back to the monitor when a separate referee confirms he was right? Madley yellow is correct for me, the force is put mostly into the ground and on the shoe rather than anywhere higher that endangers the safety Jones not being a red is just “lol England”, nothing else needs to be said. This ties into the point above about VAR because if two separate referees believe yellow was correct, there’s no reason to send him back to the monitor, even if it’s wrong You don’t even need data to see that. La Liga and especially Ligue 1 give out way more red cards. Ligue 1 red card rate is crazy
They could have added 25 more minutes of stoppage and it's unlikely we would have scored yesterday. Yes, I know that's not your point.
Because the VAR is not confirming that the call was correct, just that it doesn't meet the threshold of being a "clear and obvious" error. And since that standard is not clearly defined, nobody knows where exactly that threshold is. In this case, both myself and many other observers thought that this was a clear and obvious error and that the VAR should have intervened to recommend a RC. But obviously the VAR did not.....
My understanding is that clear and obvious depends specifically on the ref's report of the incident, and a theoretical difference (or "error") between the ref's statement and the actual replay footage. And if there is nothing that VAR considers a "clear & obvious" error when comparing those two things... then not only is there no reason for VAR to recommend review, but in fact that's VAR working as intended to not intervene. That's the high bar. So for me, it seems to be that without knowing the specifics of the ref's statement on the incident one cannot make an informed statement on whether or not the "clear & obvious" threshold was met.
While I agree with everything you say here, what is truly unbelievable is that many officials, especially English officials, do not follow protocol. If the referees are not going to follow it, how should fans fully understand it? You correctly say here, "If the VAR doesn’t recommend a review, it means you now have two different referees who have come to the same conclusion." The problem is when two different referees have come to different conclusions. Under the protocol, an OFR should occur ONLY if VAR determines the conclusion of the on-field referee is clear error. But that's not what we often see. Even when given VAR commentary, we often hear, "I got (foul) on number x" without much discussion of whether the referees determination of no foul was clear error. Yes, it could be argued that the referees know the standard and wouldn't offer the "I got" comment without determining that clear error didn't exist. Unfortunately, egos are big and we often get things sent for OFR that never should have been sent down as difference of opinion =/= clear error.
These are still humans acting as VAR. I understand the frustration of some things being viewed as clear and obvious when other stuff isn’t, but when a VAR has an opinion that a subjective decision was clearly and obviously wrong, what else are they supposed to do? This isn’t baseball balls and strikes where you could objectively see a strike zone and see that a call was missed. You have humans making decisions about subjective incidents, unfortunately people will have different opinions and view something as clear and obvious that might not be, and it gets viewed as “re-refereeing” as a result
What are they supposed to do? While they may believe something is subjectively wrong, they have a duty to take a moment and ask themselves, "Is there a means by which the law supports the CR's call/non-call?" If so, let it go.
Things that one referee’s opinion views as not clear and obvious might be clear and obvious by another referee’s opinion. That’s the issue here. You’re relying on a referee to subjectively decide if an error is clear and obvious or not. The only calls that VARs are calling objectively is an offside decision, and they don’t make them go to the monitor for that, if all they have to see is if they’d behind 2LD or not (not including if the offside player “interfered” with play). So these calls, there isn’t the chance for it to be not properly called down
Dale's word salad on the Martinez non-red is absolutely comical. https://www.espn.com/soccer/story/_...tinez-cole-palmer-man-united-chelsea?_nocache
It's same thing every week. Basically, it checks all the boxes for intervention bur because there is this absurdly high bar the VAR will not intervene and, thus, the lack od intervention was correct. He has been siting how the EPL has so many less red cards given on the field and via VAR for SFP compared to the rest of Europe as proof that what they are doing is right instead of revealing that what they are doing is backwards.
Seems pretty reasonable explanation of the events to me... explaining why a thing happened the way it did isn't the same as trying to make excuses for that thing. If prem clubs have an issue with the high bar, surely it's on them to vote it changed? They certainly don't have an issue with VAR in an overall sense. And for me, the prem should be making more of an effort explaining why that is... and less time waffling about subjective, semi-borderline incidents which could go either way and will never be excised from the game no matter what VAR protocol looks like.