What would you suggest Ma should call in real time? From your “refereeing is an art” perspective. Because again, he needs to make a call, and there are decent arguments either way and neither team will feel like the outcome is fully just. I think the direction he ultimately went was an attempt to find a “middle ground” that pleased everyone, but, as should be evident, bending the rules to invent a middle ground, one that’s wrong in multiple ways in opposite directions instead of just one, isn’t an approach that holds water. Especially not in the age of 5 slow-mo replays and VAR. I think the modern era forces the practical answer to be closer to the classroom answer more than in years past.
Does he? Ball ended up in the goalkeeper's hands, right? Like you said, it's not PIADM (certainly not on the attacker). And the attacker's foot and head didn't make visible contact. So there's nothing there. Attacker stayed down injured, correct? Ball is in goalkeeper's possession. If you (or Ma, in this case), have a penalty for the swinging arm, then that's the call. But if you (or he) don't in real-time, you stop play, assess and treat the injury if necessary, and then restart with the ball going back to the goalkeeper. And if the attacker gets up for whatever reason in a short period, you just keep playing without any call. And I want to say that I'm not 100% against the penalty outcome. But it has to be in real-time and decisive.
Oh, and to answer your earlier question, yes, the whistle went after the arm in the face, so it would have been possible for this play to be reviewed.
The referees for the decisive Group C clashes in Africa: NGA-BEN: Amin Omar (EGY) RSA-RWA: Mehrez Melki (TUN)
Uganda's final match at Algeria might end up being the most important of them all (or at least in that tier). Any idea who is on it? It does seem notable that the second place situation became relatively straightforward. Dumb luck, really, but good luck, too.
Just turned this one on. Referee is Ahmad Heeralall from Mauritius. I don’t agree with the penalty that led to Algeria’s equalizer, to me it looked like the Algerian initiated the contact and then went down without a foul by the Ugandan defender. I also hate how the Ugandan captain didn’t get at least booked for chest bumping and putting his hands on the referee in the aftermath, that sort of behavior should be an automatic red card in my view. On the replay of that decision, they also showed a handball situation that was not given, where the ball hit an Ugandan defender’s arm in the penalty area. I thought it was a handball, perhaps it is slightly subjective if you think it is a natural position. Now a second penalty given to Algeria around the 86th minute, and I agree with this one. The goalkeeper got the ball but went through the attacker’s back to do it. Absolutely massive delay on this one, exceeding ten minutes as both players involved in the collision received what (I’m not a doctor, but…) looked like very unprofessional medical care, particularly dangerous if the goalkeeper had a head or neck injury. I don’t know if I’ve ever seen a delay quite like this.
Uganda held a surprise lead for almost 75 minutes then conceded a penalty to make it 1-1. Then at 85' another penalty for Algeria. Keeper lost his head and went through an opponent from behind unnecessarily. Keeper seriously injured himself committing the foul and isn't off the field until 90+6' (so, yes, 10-11 minutes down) and penalty not taken until 90+9'. Referee put up +10 at 90' so you'd think we're at least +19 here. Uganda now needs two goals.
As good as the 85' call was, the 79' penalty looks really suspect or soft to me. Worth a look for those with ESPN streaming access. Referee is Heeralall of Mauritius, by the way. Veracity of the first penalty aside (and that is a BIG aside given the ramifications of that KMI), I like what I see from him insofar as presentation and personality goes.
The irony here is that the captain probably prevented worse behavior from his teammates. Won't come as a surprise that while I agree he (or someone else) should have been booked for dissent, unless the sport changes overnight you just can't give red for that. He was exuberant and inappropriate, but on balance he was the most responsible party in the vicinity of the referee. If you send off the captain for that (I'd call it quasi-aggressive touching of the referee) in that situation, it all completely unravels. We're talking about a country trying to reach its first World Cup and having a shock lead against a favorite away from home. Emotions are high. I thought Heeralall handled it well overall, aside from the lack of yellow.
So check my math on this. Assuming this Uganda loss holds, then DR Congo advances to the playoff over Burkina Faso with a win tonight against Sudan. The only caveat being that if that happens and Senegal loses against Mauritania, then Burkina Faso is in and Senegal is out on goal difference. Right?
Again a delay due to fans throwing objects onto the field after the Qatar goal, with the referees communicating with AFC authorities before continuing. AR2 was even helping clean up some trash, and I think Tantashev has some blood on his hand! Reminder that the winner of this game advances to the World Cup. A draw would be good enough for UAE. And the loser probably goes to the playoff. The only exception remaining would be a 2-1 Qatar loss, in which case it would go to fair play points vs Oman. Currently, Qatar have had two fewer YCs than Oman.
I think this is right. Senegal is +15 now but 9 of those are against South Sudan, which won't count. They are effectively +6. If they lose, they can't be better than +5. And Burkina Faso is +6. Feel like Senegal losing at home to Mauritania would be quite surprising, though. I had been struggling to see how Nigeria had a chance at top four second place, but missed the fact they dropped points to Zimbabwe, which helped them (a lot). Fascinating. Burkina Faso really looking like the hard-luck losers here, though Sudan taking points at DR Congo doesn't look insane on paper.
Red card to Qatar for SFP. They’re up 2-0, jt they have to see out a whopping 15 minutes of added time with ten men.
A third stoppage for fans throwing objects onto the field in Qatar, this is getting ridiculous now. People need to be removed from the stadium. It’s dangerous to the players and especially the assistant referee.
Wait, I don’t understand how he blew the final whistle there right at the original 15. I don’t say it lightly that this is absolutely disgraceful. We had several minutes of delays in added time and a grand total of 0 minutes got added back on.
- 92:45: QAT injury, then GK goes down after the first injury is done and receives treatment on pitch. Restart 94:45 (2 minutes) - 97:50: UAE goal. Restart ~98:40 (50 seconds) - 100:20: UAE YC (bad YC anyways), QAT player receives treatment on field. Restarr 101:50 (1.5 minutes) - 104:00: YC to both teams including DR by QAT. Restart 104:40 (40 seconds) We lost five minutes due to legitimate stoppages, including a DR card and two cases of the winning team receiving medical treatment on the field, and he blew the whistle immediately at the end of the original 15 minutes. Genuinely unbelievable. This does a complete disservice to The Game, to UAE’s World Cup Qualifying campaign, and to a terrific match that was building to an exciting climax.
This international window has been a great showpiece for why Collina has been leaving CAF and AFC on the bench in late stages of FIFA competitions.
Going to be harder to do in a 48-team event. You could see some wild stuff next summer. Hate to say it, but I bet it will be the tournament that has the most attention on refereeing since 2002.
Conversely, bravo to Adham Makhadmeh in KSA vs Iraq. Very intense atmosphere and difficult match but he had a very, very strong presence and was on top of everything. Many good YCs spotted all good decisions in the final third, and awesome strong presence and personality to manage players’ emotions, diffuse tense situations, explain decisions etc. I think this is the first time I’ve watched Makhadmeh this cycle, and only watched him once or twice previously, but he looked awesome here, much better than anyone else in AFC this round including Faghani. Sample size of n=1 for now, but I hope to watch him in some big games in the Arab Cup, with the potential for him to attend the World Cup in 2026.
So UAE v Iraq in an elimination home-and-home. Can you send Faghani to that? The sensitivities around Iran v Iraq have sort of evolved, so maybe. Options are pretty limited here. Maybe Al-Jassim? Or Makmademeh again? And unless the rankings are drastically altered on October 23, the CAF semifinals will be: Nigeria v Gabon Cameroon v DR Congo Those are single-elimination home matches with the winners playing at the higher remaining seed (Gabon is lowest and cannot get a home match unless, again, rankings change dramatically). Very much looking forward to who gets called for those three games.
Absolutely nothing to do with refereeeing, but after watching the highlights I note that the second Qatari goal was one of the worst plays I've ever seen from a high-level goalkeeper in a big moment. What on earth was he doing? Also, on refereeing... pretty bad that SFP needed an OFR. That's as clear as they come.
I recall Faghani had some controversy with Iraq at the last Asian Cup, where he sent off an Iraqi player and apparently some politics got involved. I think that was in the Round of 16 pre maybe even late group stage, and it was his last game of the tournament. Very interested to see what the assignments are here because there aren’t a ton of other good options. I wonder if the Arab Cup referees will be available for the November international window? Because if not, that restricts your options even further (no Makhadmeh repeat, no Al-Kaf, etc.) The CAF games are to be played in a neutral site (Morocco), rather than home matches for the higher seed.