Saw it the exact opposite the same way Rizzoli did. English attacker knew he was going nowhere and immediately did the "oh, I'm impeded!" move. Thought it was the right call.
To the contrary - I think it's been a nice game that he's called. There are one or two arguable calls, none of which are game changers / vital decisions. Both teams appear to be intent on actually playing a football match rather than killing each other. as of 83 mins, I'm pretty pleased.
Meaning what? I'm not for either side. I'm commenting about Rizzoli's work. It's been a nice match and I think he's dealt with it well. There haven't been any huge decisions - what's he's been expected to deal with, he's done. What else are you looking for?
I'd say 3 or 4 arguable calls, but I'm with you on the sentiment. This has been fine. Not really a test for him, but he hasn't put a foot wrong on any big calls, with both cards being correct. A few foul calls not made or could have gone the other way, but that's really it. Honestly, the game sucks. But Rizzoli hasn't made it any worse. I'd contrast that a little bit with Kassai yesterday, who was in the middle of a really good game and had the ability to help make it better but did not. Nothing Rizzoli could have done today to improve the entertainment value. A couple fouls are always going to be missed--we might be noticing them a little more because there really has been almost nothing else to notice in this match.
Rufus, for each of your posts, I saw enough for a whistle. But I didn't think any of them were screamers. OTOH, there were numerous attempts throughout the game to play the ref, and I think this guy has done a great job of countering that. Some of these decisions are no doubt influenced by that dynamic.
Points go to Ballack for trying to convince that Red Headed dork what football is about. I wasn't impressed either Ballack.
You know that feeling you get when you identify an advantage, and it leads to a goal? Do you think Rizzoli got that on England's goal? He spent a good deal of effort cleaning up that restart.
Safe to say I've not seen one positive comment about him from any of my English refereeing friends, and many of them NEVER slate referees. I thought he was ok at best. Seemed to miss several clear fouls. His AR on the near side seemed to pick them up for the French in the first half, but forgot what a foul was in the second half when the English were fouled. My main criticism was how inconsistent he was. The French realised this and played him like a fiddle. The number of times French players did a cute little trip or barge or hold to stop England's more skilful/quicker players starting a counter attack was beginning to become farcical towards the end. And Rizzoli unfortunately fell for it, either giving nothing or just a free kick, allowing the French to regroup and get back to defend the free kick. Cabaye did this two or three times and barely got a word (the worst of all blocking off Cole from getting on the end of a pass from Young which would have seen him attacking the last defender), while Ribery just barged Chamberlain off the ball to stop him getting in to the French half and running at the last defenders. Fortunately neither side played it particularly rough, so he had no big decisions to make, but he needs to wise up a bit if he's to get the full respect of the players. The English players were getting visibly more annoyed towards the end at the French tactics and the lack of punishment for them.
Curious to know what others think: On the pass back to Hart from Cole (I think) as far as I can tell the French player never touches the ball and Hart slides and picks it up. Indirect free kick inside the six is it not?
Will have to find / watch the clip - but even if true, kick would be placed on the six, not inside....
If I remember this incident correctly, Hart slides to tackle the ball away, knowing that it's a backpass, and then it hits the French player. Only then does he actually handle the ball. It made me think for a split-second when it happened, but it looked to be a correct no-call.
Pretty sure he's referring to those players on England who are among the more/most skillful on their side, rather than in contrast to the French players.
Correct. I'm talking about stopping Oxlade-Chamberlain from using his pace to attack the defence, or stopping Young and Welbeck from instigating attacks all with cute little trips and tricks that appeared insignificant but actually were done quite deliberately knowing the potential for problems those players could cause if allowed to get into their stride/space. Sadly Rizzoli wasn't awake to this.
I think you underestimate Rizzoli - I suggest he was quite aware of this; it's not like these would be tactics that the French invented just for this match. He just didn't think they were as significant as you appear to think. IMO, overall he called a good game. The fact that neither team capitalized on the good opportunities they had is not Rizzoli's fault.
Anyone read what good ol' Pollie had to say about Rizzoli's performance? http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/eu...m-Poll.html?ITO=socialnet-twitter-mail_gpoll# Can't imagine what Poll will say when a ref actually makes a crucial game changing mistake against England. I know Poll is appealing to English fans and has his English hat on here and not his ref hat on, but it's a little too much here. I don't know if he ever saw Collina ref, but he was one of the most demonstrative and visible refs there was. Collina never said that the best ref is the one who goes unnoticed. He said that "The best referee is one who has the courage to make decisions even when it would be easier not to." I get saying that a ref wasn't fair to a team if the caution count as 4-0 to or 6-0 and then you can state a case at least. But showing two cards to your team and none to the other and suddenly he wasn't balanced? Ridiculous. Poll was right about a lot of the tactical and cynical fouls gone unpunished, but that isn't really unique to Rizzoli only. Either it's a tournament directive/instruction or the refs are overreacting to Carballo's performance in the opener. It seems cards for PI and tactical fouls have gone out the window. If this match was in Serie A, Rizzoli would have had at least 7 cautions. Frankly, I thought Rizzoli was excellent. Allowed the game to flow, let a lot of trifling fouls go. He did miss the Gerrard foul on the edge of the area, but sold it well and Gerrard overplayed the contact. The Wellback impeding no call was just beautiful. As MassRef said, don't look for the ref to bail you out because you have a poor touch. Loved how he put Wellback in his place. Rizzoli basically refereed it like an EPL match with a little more histrionics. If Webb had done a game like this Poll would come with a headline saying "Webb Put ona Referee Masterclass." The way he handled the Ribery embellishment after the foul by Johnson was textbook in my opinion. Just great. Might try that in my next match. Personally, I would have like some more cards for tactical fouls in this game, but it seems refs are taking, as MassRef put it, the path of least resistance approach. Either it's a UEFA/FIfA instruction or the refs are getting the message that in order to get the biggest assignments you have to go with the approach that Webb and Kassai use. They are seeing what Webb and Kassai are doing and copying it.
I'm genuinely confused by this talk of the French breaking up English attacks and committing cynical or tactical fouls. I think there are two incidents people could point to that might fit that realm: A) the block of Gerrard B) the alleged impeding of Wellbeck But here's the thing: Rizzoli didn't determine that either was a foul. Now, you can argue with those interpretations (one replay looked like he got the Gerrard call wrong, although as RedStar91 points out, Gerrard oversold the contact; but I still haven't seen anything that convinces me Wellbeck was actually fouled). But it's not like Rizzoli was calling these fouls and ignoring misconduct. Where were all these other instances of cynical play that people are talking about? Where did the French break up English attacks other than those two incidents? I just didn't see it. There were a couple more potential fouls that Rizzoli opted to ignore, as I said above, but they seemed the run-of-the-mill sort. There's an irony that RedStar91 really nailed on the head: Rizzoli reffed it like an EPL match in a lot of ways. Webb would have been lauded for this in a Big 4 match back home. Yet English fans somehow find a way to project blame on the referee here. I wouldn't say Rizzoli was masterclass, but I'm very surprised with some of the criticism.
We've had threads on here where refs scream that expressions from players like "call it both ways" set them off because they infer that they are being accused of cheating. Let me suggest that any author who headlines their article questioning the "fairness" of the referee is guilty of the same. All refereeing credentials have been surrendered at that point. He is left with being a partisan and a seller of newpapers. Both honorable pursuits. Neither part of referee assessment.
I think you'll find that, almost universally in print/online media, authors do not pick their titles. EDIT: with the obvious exception of personal sites/blogs, of course EDIT #2: I still think it's a stupid article, though!
OK, fair enough. I guess. I'm not a media guy (though I really wonder if he's handing in his resignation this morning because the headline writers made it seem he was questioning the integrity of a referee). And I know he's a god. I even think some of his points have merit. But: "But I didn't see much fairness to both sides in Donetsk." If his point were to be put forth by an assessor, I would expect it to read something like: "You missed the tactics being used by team x" NOT: "I was left wondering how fair the Italian was to Roy Hodgson's side" My only real point is that his tone would probably not pass muster as a post on this site. Which, to the rest of the world, probably makes perfect sense.
I didn't watch the whole game closely. My impression was he had a bit of an inconsistent performance. The pass back was a miss. Nasri realized it was going to be a pass back and avoided the ball so it went directly to Hart. No fault to Rizzoli there though as it was incredibly tight. Probably should have been seen by the AAR assuming he sees the defender play it.