I agree for most situations. But, no, a forearm to the back of the head as you're plowing through a guy should be a yellow even if it's right after the whistle for kickoff.
The ref let a lot of stuff go, especially in 1T, and I think that was probably his plan. This was a WC Semi, between two teams who can be physical. There were fouls that by the letter of the law shoulda been called, and some shoulda been carded, but I didn't really mind it. Because it didn't really get out of hand. I felt like he was allowing things that maybe flirted with egregious, but generally didn't cross that line. He started issuing cards as they got close to HT. I think there were 2 cards in each half? Had he doled them out more liberally, he could've ruined the game. We've seen that happen and it's always regrettable.
I just heard that DJT is now confirmed to attend Sunday's final in NJ (and not the Saturday game in Miami). If he/they show his face to the crowd, or if he presents the trophy, it'll be "interesting" to hear how strong the boos are.
Ive seen some good breakdowns on the England loss and the main things were about how Tuchel said, when he got the job, that England weren't brave enough at times and had no identity. But yet under Tuchel England don't really have an identity besides "hope Kane\Jude bail you out" and England weren't brave after scoring against Argentina. I liked the idea of Tuchel saying he was picking a squad like you would build a team at club level but then there were players like White-Gibbs and Bowen who should be in the squad ahead of Madueke. Also no foreign manager has won a world cup relative to the squad. I don't know how much you should read into that but it's certainly something to consider. Looking at the current list of English managers I don't think Tuchel did better than a Lampard\Howe would have done. But then I don't really rate Tuchel. Either way I don't back England to succeed under Tuchel and any trophies they win, I.e the Euros, feels like it will be off the back of other teams underperforming rather than England over performing.
The players have agency. If you plow through someone and deliver a forearm to the head, you should get a yellow card. And it's not the ref "ruining the match" if he doles one out in that situation. In fact, not doing so is risking player safety.
“Ruining the match” was not alluding to a single yellow but to potentially many yellows and a red or two. I’ve listened to a fair amount of analysis of this match, and there’s definitely a split between people who think the ref was poor and people who think the ref did a decent job. England fans, not surprisingly, tend to be in the first category. And as much as I was rooting for England, I am not an England fan, and am in the second category. And it seems perhaps a good example of what Elliot talks about from time to time about people having extreme black-and-white positions on football people or performances: they’re either great or shit. When in fact, there’s more nuanced grayness. YMMV and that’s OK
No, now you're the one failing to see nuance because you're not reading the entire conversation, only what you want to read. In the very first post on this particular topic, I AGREED that overall Elfath was decent and that carding everyone too quickly needlessly can ruin a match. And he certainly was not the reason England lost. But, he was wrong not to card Enzo on that 3rd minute challenge, unless for some reason he just missed/was blocked from seeing the forearm to the back of the head part. And I was ambivalent about England in that match. I always want to see Arsenal players do well and more importantly not get injured. I do find most of the Argentina players other than Messi to be rather odious, but didn't really care much about the outcome of the match.
You’re right. I stand corrected. I didn’t read your post slowly and clearly enough. We seem to be in rough agreement. Yoohoo!
Can’t blame the ref for anything. They always let the little things go at the start of the match the frustrating thing is pretty much dominating the game u til their attacks and goals player form player, we should be outclassing them and I feel like Spain will the lack of options to hit balls deep from when we bunkered was stupid. Just making it into a training ground attack vs defence with an extremely shaky defence hopefully people will realise how good a fully fit Saka is, we really struggled on that side and Rodger’s was obviously not a first choice there
You had to move the whole team out of the defensive third (the box really). Hitting balls deep was just turning over possession again. I heard that you all had two passes, which were your CB to your keeper and vice versa. Someone needed to get on the ball, but panic set in, and there were too many defenders on the field to work out of the back. What I can’t explain is how they won so many headers in the box. That should have been one of England’s strengths. Anyway, that was your strongest squad in a long while. You had the squad to win it all, but you panicked. We did too, so there is no judgment from me.
Yeah I don’t get the headers considering we had much more height and additional defenders that’s why you have to still have midfielders to close the ball down and wide paced attackers as an outlet Kane should’ve come off for Rashford or Watkins as a runner
what’s odd to me is the whole idea of reffing matches based on vibes rather than offences right in front of your nose. Sports like Rugby and Cricket don’t have this idea.
So THAT'S why Decs wanted to play!!! 1-0! 3rd minute. Easy peasy. p.s. With the line-ups out there this could possibly be a goal-fest!
Saka makes it Arsenal 2-0 France. Sadly he's offside. England boys seem to be playing with wounded pride. Rightly so.
Or Tuchel is letting them play with freedom tonight? I can only imagine the internal discussions that happened after the last match, between him and the players. Tonight I think this seems to be the players saying "look what we can do if we play positively" and maybe "... allowed to play positively"?
Very happy for Bukayo but get that boy off the pitch soon! Please????? Instead Tuchel makes just 1 sub at HT: Watkins for Rashford.