Revs' Franchino vows to keep his cool By Gus Martins, Boston Herald Playoff chances hurting, Injuries decimate Revolution offense By Frank Dell'Apa, Globe Staff
Good Martins article - nice job of getting Franchino on record to clear the air. Interesting comments about Bradley. The Magpie
Any coach with half a brain would try to get at least a yellow out of Franchino. It's up to him to not let that happen.
My favorite line from FDA's article ... Joe-Max Moore, Pat Noonan, Major League Soccer scoring leader Taylor Twellman, plus newcomers Chris Brown and Dario Fabbro have all demonstrated a knack for converting goals. Yeah ... the same Dario Fabbro that has ... well 0 goals this year. Of course, JMM and Noonan have chipped in for three each ... an average of once every four games for both. And from Gus' story: ``Clint's the type of guy who is always mouthing off and bickering with everybody, including his teammates and the referee. He's also a U.S. Soccer poster boy. So when he threw an elbow at me I thought enough was enough. I thought I held my emotions intact. But what he did was wrong. ``Coach (Steve Nicol) said that if I had just hit the deck and laid there, I wouldn't have gotten a red card,'' Franchino said. ``From that standpoint, I'm sorry that I hurt the team. The coach feels I overreacted. But I don't think that anything would have happened if I didn't react. ``I don't think Clint would have gotten a card at all.'' I have to agree with what Joey says. Every call at Rutgers was received by Mathis' bitching, for and against the Mutts it seemed.
I can't really disagree with much that Joey says, (besides his speculation that Mathis wouldn't have gotten a yellow - if not, so what?), but somehow I think he's missing the big picture. Fact is, if you know what you're opponent's going to do in advance (i.e., target you physically), you've won half the battle. Now all you have to to is use this to your own advantage. The recent yellow cards and ejections have hurt the team: that's a fact. Yet in the two most recent incidents (Franchino's and Pierce's ejections), the players had every reason to believe they might be targeted for provocation. Ergo...
Those comments regarding Mathis are pretty revealing. I'm a huge fan of Mathis, he's honestly my favorite nat and pretty much can do no wrong in my eyes, but jeez has he developed a poor reputation.
I still haven't seen the play (which is why you haven't seen my name in either forum's discussion about the incident: I don't like to comment on something I haven't seen), but some of Franchino's comments in this article strike me as a bit...odd. Even the folks on this forum admit that Joey went a bit psycho, but Franchino says: "``Clint's the type of guy who is always mouthing off and bickering with everybody, including his teammates and the referee. He's also a U.S. Soccer poster boy. So when he threw an elbow at me I thought enough was enough. I thought I held my emotions intact. But what he did was wrong." He held his emotions intact? Also, the way he describes it, he makes it sound as if Mathis threw an elbow from the top rope. Based on what's been written, whether you say it was a weak forearm to gain seperation or an intentional elbow, BOTH sides admitted that Franchino was already fouling the hell out of Mathis. I don't like dirty play from anyone (and Mathis deserves a suspension for mouthing off to the ref as much as Franchino deserves one for attacking Mathis) but Franchino comes off as if he didn't do a damn thing wrong. If that's his view of the game, it's downright scary. Or sad.
Jacen. Video of the altercation is currently on-line at Revolutionsoccer.net. Just go to the website, scroll down to where it says "Exclusive interview with Twellman on this week's RVN" and click on the accompanying link that says "Watch RVN Now." Fast forward to 4:17 into the segment and you'll see the "fracas" as Brad Feldman describes it. If you review the incident several times you clearly see Mathis swing back with a deliberate elbow, Franchino then going postal on him in retaliation, but seemingly not with a series of punches as has been described - can't see Franchino drawing his arm back to strike. Quite simply: Mathis deserved the red, and Franchino deserved the red, the latter as I've said before probably with some further sanction. That being said I'd beg to differ with Franchino: He did not appear to keep his emotions in check. Maybe up until Mathis threw the elbow did he keep them in check, and perhaps that was the point he was trying to convey. The Magpie
I still think the fact that he got stitches in his face from an elbow in July factored into his reaction...
Thanks for the location of the video, but unfortunately, on my college budget, dial up is all I can afford. Makes downloading video kinda tough. That's why I didn't make any concrete statements regarding the incident. You may be right, they may be right on the elbow issue, but I reserve judgement until I can actually see the replay. My comments above were more tailored to the things everyone agreed about- namely: Franchino fouling Mathis before the elbow/forearm, Franchino tackling Mathis, and Mathis spewing at the ref afterwards. Based on that, Franchino comes off poorly in the article. I agree with him in areas. Mathis has no right to talk to the official in such a manner, no matter how incompetent they may be. For his post-card tirade, Mathis is just as deserving of a multi-game suspension as Franchino. I also thought one of his comments was telling. When he mentioned Mathis was the US Soccer poster boy. It lends credence to the reports from folks on here that Mathis was making comments on the field about Franchino not being in Korea. Also, Soccertim, that could well be that he was more defensive due to a past elbow. I know that I guard my knee very closely since my injury. That puts it in a perspective, just be careful not to use it as an excuse (which I don't think you were doing)