Er...didn't a guy named Glenn have something to do with it too? Stott was astoundingly bad BTW. To me the single most unbelievable call was the yellow card given to a Chivas player (don't know who), apparently for daring to tread on the same piece of grass as Cobi Jones - causing Mr. Jones to prompty fall down. Almost hilarious - if it weren't that this is the US's highest level professional soccer league.
I only saw the 2nd half last night if the LA Chivas robbery I agree that the USSF top refs have went down hill in the last couple of years. We do not deserve a ref at the world cup based on what i have saw in the last 4 years. To give the guy a card for diving when it was so obvious even at real time that he had been taken down was so terrible. I was at the DC united and Dynamo game and wondered about some calls. Although oer all i thought he called a decent game.
Stott certainly missed the PK-yellow card deal with Garcia and the non-foul by Francisco Mendoza on Cobi Jones. In the latter situation I think the announcers were saying that the yellow card was for accumulation, though the replay clearly showed Cobi just slipped and fell. On the former, when I saw it live I didn't think it was a penalty because I didn't think there was enough contact and I thought the ball was getting away from him. However, it certainly wasn't a dive. On the replay the contact looked much worse and he may have been able to play the ball after all. Those plays, Stott just missed. That stuff about the throw-in, I'm not real sympathetic to the complaint. So he blew the whistle a split second after the ball was thrown in. Big deal. Chivas was defending the play, and if they weren't they should have been.
Handball not called: Deal with it. It was not intentional, so it's within the referee's rights to not call it. Could have gone either way. The yellow card for the dive: Bad call. I don't think it's a penalty -- the attacker probably wasn't going to get to the ball first, so it's probably a no-call. But it's certainly not a dive. The disputed goal: I don't know if Stott blew the whistle saying the sub was coming or not. But it certainly didn't look to me like Chivas was standing around. It looks to me like they just got beaten.
Hit it right on the spot. the USSF is a joke, not only for "training" and "monitoring for errors" to refs, but in a variety of their responsibilities as a whole- the lack of marketing in general, their poor grass roots efforts, ....I don't want to even talk about how they run the U.S. Open Cup....the list goes on and on, when in reality, their problem is everyone is protecting their turf without actually making any progress whatsoever for the game of soccer in the U.S. Regarding Stott and other MLS refs, their officiating has always been horrible, but I think its Fifa being concerend about referreeing gaffs for the 2006 World Cup that it couldnt avoid in Korea/Japan in 2002 from unsuitable referees in important games. The refs from Ecuador and Egypt come to mind.
1st Penalty: Garcia pulled down 2nd Penalty: Handball in box from Razov(?)'s shot 3rd "Penalty": Garcia threw himself on the ground. Only the first 2 should have been given.
I didn't even think about the handball in the box. The thing with the O'Brien non-sub, was that O'Brien was ready to sub in for 4 minutes or so standing there. It was a throw-in and the replay shows stott looking that way, turns around, dunivant is throwing the ball, and THEN whistles to start play. He was caught up in the moment, and at that point HAD NO CONTROL OF THE MATCH. Look if I was in Dunivant's position I do the same thing. But to say that Chivas was fully focused when they expect a sub to come on is absurd. Stott should take a week or two off to refocus, because he was a joke.
Well..., here's the deal: From now on Chivas should keep in mind that they are always going to play against 14 people (11 players + 3 ref), and they have to find the way to overcome that with 11 players.
Stott is usually pretty solid However, I'm really beginning to think there's some sort of Anti-Chivas conspiracy in MLS/Referreeing HQ. It seems every game they get scummed, in one way or another. [As people seem to be taking this literally, I'll point out this was tongue in cheek. They have been on the bad en of some lousy calls since they joined the league, and are on a particularly bad run right now, not of their own form, just piss poor calls by refs.]
I sincerely doubt there is an anti-Chivas bias here. AS Bradley said, it evens out over the season. The fact remains though, that over the past 2 weeks, Chivas has lost 4 legitimate points, because of incompetent refereeing. I'm more pissed off about general incompetency about the refs than anything else. Same with that phantom-pk against the Crew. I just think that this Chivas game had more blown calls on important plays than I've seen in a long time, and something has to be done.
well, i for one do not believe in the conspiracy theory. I just believe that USSF and their refs and the trainers and such are in it for themselves and they suck. Just because they have a badge does not mean they do not need to continue upgrading their skills. Refs are famous for that crap, not trying to upgrade themselves, some of them don;t even watch games. I wrote an article about my beliefs about a year ago, and a couple of refs wrote me and told me they agreed with me.
Jesus, that was a disgraceful call. Simmons should simply be sacked. His continued officiating is to the detriment of the whole league.
The other thing that was wrong about the non-handball call in the Chivas game was the fact that they blew offsides on the follow-up to the play. Can a guy be offsides when it ricochets off two (not just one) defenders? I thought deflection off a defender made the play onsides. Stott blew it all over the place with at least four bad decisions and a couple other marginal ones. I agree that Simmons blew the PK. Okalaja was awful in the DC match as well. And I have never seen him be so inconsistent between two teams. Usually he calls it bad both ways, but he was anything but a home-cookin' ref last night. He totally blew a backpass that Onsted picked up under pressure. He gave a yellow card to Serioux when he scissored a DC player with his cleats at least 6 inches off the turf. He called pathetic ticky-tacky fouls whenever Houston guys fell over (Craig Waibel dove at least three times. Craig Waibel) and refused to give out yellow cards when Dynamo midfielders cut down (without any possible argument that it was a dive since he did call fouls) DC midfielders in full flight. The only officiating Houston could have been upset were some tight offsides calls, but they were offsides so badly that it was hard to give their forwards the benefit of the doubt. P.S. As a DC fan who enjoys watching possession soccer, I have to say that Chivas are the second most entertaining and fluent team to watch in MLS. They got completely robbed last night. Two decent plays (though Glen looked offsides to me on the second goal - I never saw a great angle to judge conclusively from) overcame a game that was dominated up-and-down the field by Chivas. Sampson does not have the Galaxy playing well.
That's not true. If the attacking player was in an offside position when his teammate struck the initial ball, deflections off defenders do NOT put him back onside. That being said, I didn't have a good enough look at the play to know if it was a correct call on THIS one. But that's the rule.
I just watched the highlights at the MLSnet.com. He was on... two defenders were behind him.... But nonetheless that was not a goal anyway so does not matter.
What was the first game? If you say the DC game, check out the referee's forum. There's little doubt that the entire ball did NOT cross the entire line. Waldo doesn't know the rules. He saw that sliver of green, but the part of the ball that's in the air, that doesn't touch the ground, ALSO has to be completely over the line, which it surely wasn't. Again, to repeat, Waldo doesn't know the rules.
You're right on the first one, CLEAR CLEAR penalty, and to make it even more atrocious, a yellow for diving!!! But the second foul was outside the box, I am pretty sure, plus, it was a minimal tug. From the soccer I watch, that's a 50-50 call, and even if a foul, it's a free kick, not a PK.
I'll comment. If that play happens at midfield and is called a foul, nobody gives it a second thought. Since it's in the box, the commentators have to opine about whether the attacker could have gotten a shot off. Look, we all watch lots of soccer, and that's *A* factor, but it's not THE factor. A 50-50 call; a clear foul, but oftentimes the ref will let it slide because the touch was too heavy. But not every time.
If we're thinking of the same play, the ball was deflected by a Chivas defender before it hit the guy's arm. If we are, then no way in hell is that ever ever ever a penalty. First, the guy's arm didn't move. Now, that doesn't NECESSARILY mean no handling. You can still give it if the guy's arm isn't in a natural position, if he's got his arm out to make himself bigger. The classic example of such a play is U.S. v. Frings, 2002. But when it's deflected first, the defender obviously didn't have his arm out to make himself bigger in hopes of blocking the shot. And if he did, then that defender has the greatest reflexes in human history and should become a keeper.
No, a deflection does NOT make a play onsides. If it did, the US' 2nd goal against Portugal would have been offside. But if you want to bring up a retarded offside call...about the 53rd minute, the Revs game. Shalrie tackles the ball away and forward, a teammate tries to pass it back to him but pops it over his head, directly to KC player, who is in an offside position by several yards but not offside because a Rev played it. The retard AR pops his flag, the retard CR blows his whistle, and the KC player, you can read his lips, he was pointing out that a Rev played the ball. Horrible, inexcusable call.
a clear foul? shoulder to shoulder contact? my understanding (as a ref in my youth days, so the laws may have changed...) is that unless there are hands pushing/pulling, or legs kicking/tripping, or charging from behind, shoulder-to-shoulder is A-OK.
That was a persistent infringement yellow. Fouling every time you get beat will earn you that. The whole Chivas team contributed to it. The Garcia yellow was for his reputation as an actor/diver. Stop diving and you'll get the call.