IMO they need to loosen up on the cards & tighten WAAY up on the diving/ankle grabbing/play-acting, etc. And FIFA needs to make this a rule: "If you need a stetcher to get off the field, you'd better be really friggin injured, because you are not allowed to enter the field of play again for 30 minutes of play." Seriously, if a stretcher is needed, you should have a broken leg or a torn ACL, either way, you aint getting to your feet, jogging up & down the sidelines for 30 seconds, and then checking into the game as if "it's a MIRACLE! I'm all better now!"
never said that they're predetermined. but they're definitely not whiter than white. if for instance, we were going to beat italy, i've always thought we'd have to do it in spite of the refs in order to get by. Sepp's definitely set up a system where there is some outside control allowed of a game, not total but some. Whether it's taken advantage of, say in Italy, or not is another matter. BTW, will you ever watch another Italian club play??
Why? Even individual refs in any league vary greatly one from another. They all call matches certain ways and enforce the match accordingly, letting the players know from the get go. Players adapt to refs who are different, but consistent. Refs in this tournament have been very inconsistent.
First there where hacks, American football checks, and basketball dribbles in the box and the referrees looked the other way every single time, it was too consistent to have been honest mistakes. And now it seems set in stone that Germany will reach the final, but even with the Ref they might not be good enough to win it all. How can people think there is no conspiracy within FIFA when almost without fail the refs carry the home team at the world cup(Chile 62, England 66, Mexico 70, Argentina 78, Spain 82 and Korea 02 stand out), not one has ever lost out in the first round, and there have been some very bad ones. Argentina was ROBBED today, plain and simple. Sepp`s history, and the scandals in Germany and Italy leading up to the cup makes it all make sense. This game is too popular and there is just too much money and misguided patriotism behind it.
The US scored one fraking goal. Any suggestion that the refs had anything to do with their exit is silly. Basically the attitude here is "hey if the team I was rooting for loses then I'll just blame the refs." The refereeing has been spotty but it's still been a terrific tournament.
The US also played half a game with 9 men. Many impartial observers noticed that the call in the Ghana game against Gooch and the two reds in the Italy game were not good calls. That doesn't mean we blame the refs for everything. I think most US fans recognize we had a lot of problems offensively and that Keller may not be as great as we had hoped. The refereeing has been spotty and it hurt the US twice. It did not however hurt the US as much as the US hurt themselves. I thought the refereeing in the second round and beyond has been better save perhaps the Netherlands-Portugal game. Germany-Argentina for example I thought was very well done.
Ref's aside, Is there a more extreme apologist for all of the worst aspects of the game (diving, faking injury, bad calls) than Marcelo Balboa? His attitude represents what was always the weakest point of our older soccer generation. He is fully invested in the bullshit that makes the game a laughing stock and that shores up the poor sportsmanship we are seeing in this cup. It also happens to play right to the advantage of most US opponents. We have a steep enough hill to climb. Wake up and acknowlege that the game has a cancerous streak that needs to be removed.
I couldn't disagree more. Officiating is indeed making a farce of this tourney. Red and yellow cards are flying around like everyone's turned queer, and each game quickly becomes a tally of make-up calls where everyone is looking for the next card to offset the one their team was just issued. It's awful and it has brought the entire competition down to an unacceptable level. Tackles go in and cards come out . . . then players dive and roll around but that's not penalized. It's gone to hell. Yes, FIFA supports this, but the ref's the man in the middle and he should act like a man and not a pansy.
I voted 'par for the course'. Almost every world cup had controversy, and this time was not the exception.
Amen to that. If a player goes down and the stretcher comes out..automatic 5 minutes before person is allowed to enter back into the game. And a yellow for diving is just not enough of a deterent. OK, perhaps in the game a yellow is enough....but each one needs to be reviewed and if it is determined to be a valid dive, the player should miss the next game no questions asked. If said dive leads to a PK, the player should miss at least the next 2 games. Hell, I would even be in favor of an off field official reviewing the PKs to make sure they were not in fact dives. Lets welcome soccer to the 21st century. FIFA is ruining the game...not the refs. If FIFA stepped in and did something, the refs would not be put in these postions. FIFA needs to review these incidents and actually do something about them. Peter Crouch, you cheated and almost broke a man's neck to score a goal. Congrats, you are now suspended for the next two games.
yes they were, the two red cards on the usa were shit calls. theres no way, exspecally the straight red. ned vs por, yes alot of them were cardable offenses but not reds. too be a red card is a last resort because when you give it, it changes the game.