Community Shield 4 August 2019 Liverpool - Manchester City Wembley Referee: Martin Atkinson Assistants: Sian Massey-Ellis, Dan Cook 4th Official: Stuart Attwell Reserve AR: Neil Davies VAR: Anthony Taylor AVAR: Steve Child Atkinson's second Community Shield, having taken charge of Liverpool - Chelsea in 2006. The last person who did the Shield twice was George Courtney in 1979 and 1990. Massey-Ellis is the first female referee to be involved in the Shield. Will be interesting to see how the new rules are implemented, especially if there are penalty kicks.
Wonder if this is a sign that this could be Atkinson's last season? Sort of going away retiring gift a la Mallenco? There is, obviously, no way that Atkinson can get the FA Cup Final again and I'm assuming the policy of only appearance applies for the League Cup Final as well? This is as close as Atkinson can get to "big" assignment.
I thought the same thing. Atkinson’s international career is over and he has nothing left to prove. Plus, he can be a VAR forever and would have his leg up if he wanted to go that route. That said, my understanding is that he is very fit. And he’s still a major player for the big assignments. There’s no reason he needs to step aside unless he wants to do so voluntarily. Given England’s poor development right now, I imagine the FA wants him to continue on. So this could equally be a signal of how much he’s needed at this moment. Guess we will find out the answer in 10 months.
I was doing a quick search on Atkinson, and it seems as though since leaving the international scene, he has done 32/33 matches the last 2 years. Roger East retired at 52 this past spring. And a couple of other refs in their late 40’s have moved to the VAR chairs. I have a feeling Atkinson will keep going for at least a couple more years. Unless, VAR in the PREM is a disaster, and he’s needed there.
Atkinson and Pawson went to China to officiate the preseason Asia Trophy. Atkinson saw Wolves twice, which might be something to keep in mind as assigning starts in the new season. More importantly, the Final ended in KFTM. There were 5 misses or saves. No re-takes ordered and no yellow cards given. A couple of them are very close, but best I can tell they are all the correct calls. At least no false positives! Starts at 10:28:
https://www.thesun.co.uk/sport/foot...emier-league-referees-community-shield-riley/ Tell us how you really feel Mark. What a hack and he really has no awareness of how many bridges he's burning. Clattenburg probably hasn't had a none soccer related job maybe ever. He's gonna need the PGMOL or the FA to employ him in some capacity down the road and lighting all your former coworkers (and future bosses) up like a Christmas tree isn't going to help down the road.
Oliver with today’s opener. Taylor with the Man United-Chelsea showcase game Sunday. Atwell with two VAR assignments this weekend. Friday 9 August 20:00 Liverpool v Norwich City Referee: Michael Oliver (pictured) Assistants: Stuart Burt, Simon Bennett Fourth official: Graham Scott VAR: Andre Marriner Assistant VAR: Scott Ledger Saturday 10 August 12:30 West Ham v Man City Referee: Mike Dean Assistants: Darren Cann, Dan Robathan Fourth official: Gavin Ward VAR: David Coote Assistant VAR: Stephen Child AFC Bournemouth v Sheff Utd Referee: Kevin Friend Assistants: Matthew Wilkes, Nick Hopton Fourth official: Charles Breakspear VAR: Lee Mason Assistant VAR: Andy Halliday Burnley v Southampton Referee: Graham Scott Assistants: Neil Davies, Andy Garratt Fourth official: Ross Joyce VAR: Peter Bankes Assistant VAR: Derek Eaton Crystal Palace v Everton Referee: Jonathan Moss Assistants: Marc Perry, Eddie Smart Fourth official: Craig Hicks VAR: John Brooks Assistant VAR: Adam Nunn Watford v Brighton Referee: Craig Pawson Assistants: Ian Hussin, Richard West Fourth official: Peter Wright VAR: Andy Madley Assistant VAR: Mark Scholes 17:30 Spurs v Aston Villa Referee: Chris Kavanagh Assistants: Daniel Cook, Sian Massey-Ellis Fourth official: Tim Robinson VAR: Stuart Attwell Assistant VAR: Simon Long Sunday, 11 August 14:00 Leicester v Wolves Referee: Andre Marriner Assistants: Scott Ledger, Simon Long Fourth official: Andy Madley VAR: Jonathan Moss Assistant VAR: Andy Halliday 14:00 Newcastle v Arsenal Referee: Martin Atkinson Assistants: Lee Betts, Constantine Hatzidakis Fourth official: Darren England VAR: David Coote Assistant VAR: Nick Hopton 16:30 Man Utd v Chelsea Referee: Anthony Taylor Assistants: Gary Beswick, Adam Nunn Fourth official: Lee Mason VAR: Stuart Attwell Assistant VAR: Stephen Child
I’m watching a highlight replay in a hotel with no sound, so I am more than my usual partially handicapped, but it appeared they called a defender encroaching. At least that was the highlighted player on the replay. Declan Rice, and he looked to be a step in and he cleared the initial save.
I simply do not want to get used to these offside decisions only determined by using advanced video processing software. It continues to ruin the game IMHO.
VAR overruling penalty saves gonna be the worst storyline of the season— Men in Blazers (@MenInBlazers) August 10, 2019
I agree with that sentiment, but I just don’t see any alternative. Because unless it’s a black and white millimeter, who’s going to determine the arbitrary “amount” of offside that becomes impactful and therefore acceptable. What will it be? 10cm, 50cm, 1m? It would still be a matter of millimeters, but we’d just be “moving the goalposts”. Then we’d be scrutinizing if the player was actually 9cm or 11cm offside. It’s just a matter of where you want the scrutiny to be. Not saying I love the current setup, but there’s no other consistent way of doing it.
Instead of defining a distance, I’d just go with the same standard that has been used throughout the game. Using a full speed replay, go with the opinion of the AR, or VAR in this case. When in doubt, don’t call it. That worked for the most part, don’t see why we change that same principle. It’ll catch all of those egregious offside decisions that were simply missed. Nobody was complaining, felt wronged, or otherwise cheated by theses offside by a millimeter decisions.
Having now seen this one, I'm OK with this. GK had foot on line (so no GK encroachment and YC), but defender was in WELL before the kick was taken and was the one to clear the ball away. If he doesn't clear that ball away, then no issue here. But he does. And that's bad. And this call was good.
The Sterling goal where he was RIGHT on the offside line at the top of the area was a near perfect VAR application. Right at the start of the TV replays, I thought I saw a still frame where he MIGHT have been offside. However, it was far from conclusive or obvious. Call on the field stood. I know there would still be some subjectivity, but I’m fine with plays like this sticking with the call on the field. It’s not obvious to overturn no matter what the AR called. If you can’t run a video for 15-20 seconds and clearly see the call on the field was wrong, then stick with the on field call. This really doesn’t have to be so tough.
I'm pretty sure if you look at that still where he looked offside, it was after the ball had been kicked. Once they found the right frame with first contact on the ball, he's even.
I’m astounded that he would speak so frankly to the media TBH. I guess he doesn’t expect to work in refereeing in England again so he doesn’t care about burning bridges, etc.
That kind of proves my point. All of this looking for the right frame, first contact with the ball, etc. can’t be what people really want from VAR. At even half speed with no lines, this is too close to call. I’m fine with the call on the field standing no matter what the call. Even if Sterling was a whisker off, I’d be fine with an “inconclusive video evidence, call stands” outcome. I get this won’t happen because the technology is there to make people think they can judge these with 100% accuracy.
That's my bold underline. Because in actual fact they can't. It's just not that accurate. Here we go again.
I absolutely used “think” with full intention. The only thing that can truly be objectively judged on a field outside of mistaken identity is a ball over a line. Everything else has at least a small amount of subjective analysis. To think offside can be ruled with complete objectivity and accuracy is simply not a correct thing.
I guess every league and it's fans have to go through these several stages of acceptance (or not) of VAR. Of course since it's the Brits they don't realize everyone else in the world has already been doing this for a while now with all of the same issues.