Monday, 11 June - Donetsk - 12:00 EST France : England Referee: Nicola RIZZOLI (ITA) Assistant referee: Renato Faverani (ITA), Andrea Stefani (ITA) Additional assistant referee: Gianluca Rocchi (ITA), Paolo Tagliavento (ITA) Fourth official: Pavel Kralovec (CZE) Reserve official: Roman Slyško (SVK) UEFA Delegate: Armen Minasyan (ARM) UEFA Referee observer: Jozef Marko (SVK) Rizzoli has his full Italian quintet assisting him. The fourth official is Kralovec of Czech Republic. This thread is for all pre-, play-by-play, and post-match discussion of the referee and other officials on the match. Only news and analysis or other facts/information related to the referees and the officiating should be posted here. This is not a team or rivalry thread and will be heavily moderated to ensure it remains that way. Please read the stickied thread at the top of this forum if you have further questions. Thank you.
Rizzoli, from the same area of Italy as Collina, has been Italy's quick-rising star since Rosetti's retirement. He did the 2010 Europa League Final. His recent big matches: UCL: Basel v Bayern (R16), Lyon v Real Madrid, Valencia v Chelsea, Marseille v Olympiacos EL: Athletico Bilbao v Schalke (QF) EURO 2012 qualifiers: Denmark v Portugal, Switzerland v England, Belgium v Turkey, Montenegro v Czech Republic Somewhat oddly, he really didn't have a lot of big matches this season. Many thought he was being held for the UCL Final, on which he was the fourth official, but the referee assignment was not in the cards.
I think I've been the Vice-Chair, or at least a Board member. But his Milan derby performance has given me some pause. I really hope it's out of his system because I want to see him do well here. Did you catch that match at all?
I don't think you're going to get many people who feel similarly. Or maybe none at all. I think my red threshold is lower than that of many others, and I didn't think it was remotely close to red. Frankly, Rizzoli probably could have gotten on without a yellow, though after my criticism of Kassai yesterday, I'm glad he did not (though the AR really forced his hand). There's been nothing to do other than that tackle. Usually when people say "easy game to referee," they are saying it somewhat naively and a lot has had to do with things that the referee has done to control things preemptively and proactively. In this case, I think it truly has been an easy game to referee thus far.
I feel it was a reckless tackle, without much control exercised by the player. And in the end, unintentional probably, it was aimed at the ankle. I don't say it was a 100% red but I've seen referees giving red cards for reckless tackles like that one. A yellow was indeed the easy route.
I really don't think this was close to red - I'd go careless, bordering on to reckless, but certainly not dangerous. As such, the caution wasn't the easy route - to me it was more of a message card to keep the game calm. To Rizzoli's credit, he's not had to be nor made himself the center of attention so far.
Well, you're answering all your questions. "Reckless," to start, is the standard for a caution, not a send off. And it was unintentional where the contact was made. It was made where and how it was because the attacker cut back. Chamberlain showed no tell-tale signs of malice. Studs weren't exposed, leg wasn't raised, knee wasn't locked and there really was no significant force in it at all. Plus the contact, ultimate, was negligible. No card, in fact, would have been the easy route. I really think you are seeing more in that tackle than there was. Would be interesting to hear from others watching.
Well this England fan's $0.02... If he mad made full contact with the tackle, for sure, easy yellow card. But with what actually happened, I see that as a soft yellow. I don't have a problem with it. AS MasRef said - Rizzoli is reminding the players that he is there, and the AR forced his hand on the decision.
AR was right there also. Ribery gets clipped minutes later by Gerard, stays down and England refuses to kick the ball out (so much for the "Respect" logo on everyone's sleeve).
England was right to play on - clearly not a serious injury, England had the ball and an attack. Frankly, it would have been more respect for the game if Ribery had stood up more quickly and got on with the game. IMO, he was milking it.
Well, when a guy gets clipped like that and the ref doesn't call a foul, it's really not the other team's responsibility to stop immediately. The ref is telling everyone that he didn't think there was a foul. And how can you know immediately if an injury was serious or not? I don't fault England whatsoever on this one. That said, it was a foul, so I fault Rizzoli. He has let a few things go in the last 10 minutes. If Gerrard didn't go down theatrically and spectacularly, he might have got that call. But the one in front of the AR was just a bad miss by the AR. Interesting stuff. Nothing malicious and Rizzoli still has total control, but a few simple things in both directions just getting ignored.
If you get kicked in the achilles like he did, you're also going to stay down. I am aware. Just pointing it out.
Rizzoli gives his best, "it's not my fault you suck right now" lecture. Replay would be interesting, but think he got that right. English attacker was never getting to the ball and immediately went looking for an impeding foul.
Hey, how much more are we going to accept from this guy before we say this isn't very good? Milner is pushed in the back after chesting, and before that there was impeding in the center of the field that should have resulted in a free and a yellow but we got neither.
dealing with that "injury".... he didn't even check on the player, just called on the medics some loss of respect both ways maybe?