It makes perfect sense that he reffed big games in the World Cup. It makes it easier to fix gamed with a guy like him. Just my opinions.
The Ecuadorean soccer federation has suspended Moreno for 20 games and put him under investigation. Nice segue to his aspirations for political life. http://sports.yahoo.com/m/world/news/reuters/20020911/reu-moreno20020911.html
Brian, please post something of relevance and stop trying to inflate your post count. The information contained in your quote is verbatim to what was written in the Yahoo link posted by Quaker earlier. Of relevance is the fact that the Yahoo and Soccernet's articles stated that Moreno had been suspended for 20 rounds. A sad day indeed for Mr. Moreno.
I didn't read both articles posted previously. As a moderator you should have enough sense to edit or delete my post and send me a PM. What the hell are you talking about, "inflate your post count???" Whether you have 1 or 50,000 it makes no difference. Why would it matter how many times you've posted?
So how does one become a referee in the World Cup? Is one nominated by their federation, or chosen by FIFA, or something else? This guy is a disgrace to referees and it is amazing that he was in the World Cup.
This is very sad. I actually thought he did a good job in the WC, but this match sounds very fishy indeed. I wonder a bit about a 20 match ban. When a player is suspended for 20 matches it's easy enough to count the games his team plays. But how exactly is a 20 match suspension imposed on a referee? Is he merely out for 20 rounds of the competition? Does the league in Ecuador have such a format? For instance we all know how MLS is scheduled in such a way that teams play a different number of games in a week, sometimes 1 or 2, sometimes 0. Is it just a 20 week suspension? I suppose once they investigate further it could well end up being longer or permanent. It does seem a bit sad to me, however, that a player can assault and batter a referee and only get 4 games. Not to say of course that apparently fixing a match and then lying about it isn't a serious issue.
IMO, fixing a match by a referee is more serious than an assault on a referee -- and that's saying a LOT because I consider any referee abuse to be very serious. I believe that a player assaulting a referee should have received more than a 4 match ban, but if this allegation of fixing is proven true, 20 matches seems awfully light to me.
Really the only issue I saw with his performances in the World Cup was his send off of Totti. He was too far away to make that decisive a call. Certainly for me there was too much that was ambiguous in the players actions that it was a shock he sent him off for his second caution. I really wish posters would take the time to think before making a knee-jerk response. This guy other than the call at the end of the Italy Korea match was excellent. This disgrace of a referee did a hell of a job in the USA match against Portugal. Moreoever, we don't know what the circumstances were surrounding this match. Nobody here was at the match or saw it on TV, so we can't tell if any of the calls were made up or justified. Certainly, he did blow the send off from the written account and the goal-non-goal is poor. I also question the hearing or lack thereof by the Ecuadorian Football Federation. The articles appear to imply there was not a due process hearing for the referee to give his side other than the inconsistencies or mistakes made on his report. Finally, remember this is not the US. This is Ecuador. Politics play a big part in football.
Nothing's been forgotten. I think Moreno did a good job in the U.S. - Portugal match and a so-so job in the Italy - South Korea match. What is shocking is that a World Cup ref could deliver such a terrible performance (with definite hints of match fixing) within a couple of months of his World Cup appearance. The World Cup is the biggest stage, and any refs appearing there should possess integrity beyond question.
As far as I can tell the dubious PK's were not so much the issue as the 13 minutes of time on. When does 6 minutes ever get added unless they have to bring an ambulance out onto the field? And then to add a further 7 after the six...and the winning team scores two goals in that extra seven after the extra 6 yet gets recorded as minutes 89 and 90 in the match report. Very odd. Unless he's just got a really slow watch, in which case his ARs should have been giving him a signal. In any event, we really don't know what sort of process was followed. But it sounds like the investigation is on-going.
I think it's appropriate to reserve judgement until the facts have been presented. You're jumping to a lot of conclusions and if you think that FIFA runs a clean house you know very little about the selection process of referees or the members of that body.
Foul Why are these dubious refs allowed to remain employed? There has to be a better system of evaluating and awarding the best refs in the globe.
I'm not passing full judgment quite yet, but the facts presented so far do appear to shed very poor light on Mr. Moreno--so much so that the Ecuadorean soccer confederation has imposed a ban of a minimum of 20 weeks. Admittedly, I haven't seen the match in question, but even the Ecuadoreans who defended Mr. Moreno so vehemently during the World Cup have very strongly denounced his handling of this one. And no, I don't have any illusions that FIFA runs a clean house.
Like I said before in another similiar post..."what goes around, comes around"... ...and yet another reason to luv Italians... http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport2/hi/funny_old_game/2253473.stm