the New "Gus St. Silva is a disgracce to soccer" thread

Discussion in 'MLS: General' started by feuerfex, Aug 11, 2002.

  1. feuerfex

    feuerfex Member

    Apr 21, 2001
    At the end of last weeks episode, Gus had thoroughly trashed a match between the Chicago Fire and DC United. For those who missed that one here are a few highlights:

    "If MLS folds, it's all his fault."

    "You're just figuring out Gus sucks now?"

    "Not really. The consistency of his suckiness is just finally overwhelming me."

    "I just need to reitterate that Gus St. Silva is a disgrace to the profession of Referees."

    "Not once have I been impressed with his reffing, and when I saw that he was gonna be the ref, I knew what we were in for."


    And now, as a follow up to that pathetic example of MLS refereeing, we had the Chicago Fire vs Dallas Burn match, starring (who else) Gus St. Silva.

    On a larger stage this time (it was, after all, on national TV), Gus managed to surpass himself with new examples of incompetentcy.

    He still is (apparently) a very strong proponent of the laissez-faire approach to refereeing (either that or he has lost his red card) completely ignoring a Chad Deering handball in the box.

    Then to top it off he assumes the mantle of a Burn defender and heads out a (potentially winning) Hristo Stoitchkov bullet that was destined for the net.

    After the match, it was said that Gus issued a challenge to his MLS referee colleagues to "step up to the box" and see if they could surpass his exploits.

    We all wait expectantly.
     
  2. Jambon

    Jambon Member

    Mar 3, 2000
    Austin, TX
    You're right, he does suck. Didn't you see Vaca getting mauled all day long, but when Suarez lays a simple shoulder charge on Stoitchkov, that's suddenly too violent for a delicate flower like the Dagger?

    But seriously, did St Silva ref the last 5 Chi/Dal games in the Cotton Bowl? The results were the same. What's your excuse for all those?
     
  3. oman

    oman Member

    Jan 7, 2000
    South of Frisconsin
    whiney girl...
     
  4. ElJefe

    ElJefe Moderator
    Staff Member

    Feb 16, 1999
    Colorful Colorado
    Club:
    FC Dallas
    Nat'l Team:
    United States
    Gus St. Silva's non-call when Abuelo Stoitchkov punched Ryan Suarez in the face was a disgrace. It's referees like him that are killing this league.
     
  5. goyette82

    goyette82 Member

    Jan 16, 2000
    Lowell, Ma
    Must we always whine about the refs when we lose?
     
  6. viperdiablo21

    viperdiablo21 Member

    Jul 20, 2002
    when was this? i do believe there was something in the corner after the goal but as i remember it st. silva gave a foul and i belive stoitchkov actually apologized meaning it was an accident and had no intention of hurting him. he's world class i am pretty sure he isnt looking to pick fights. plus it was kinda funny to see suarez still adjusting his jaw about 2 minutes after the foul.
     
  7. Jambon

    Jambon Member

    Mar 3, 2000
    Austin, TX
    Yeah it was.

    Suarez welcomed him to the game with that euro style shoulder charge just so he would feel more at home and started bodying up on the Dagger pretty aggressively. So yeah, Hristo let him have one in the chops just to "clear him off the plate" a little and show the kid what's up. Hristo must have got him pretty good, because Suarez did drop awfully hard and I'm sure he didn't want to hit the turf like that in front of the old man.

    To tell the truth, I think they both kind of enjoyed the encounter. I watched Hristo shaking hands after the game and Suarez and he spoke for quite a while.
     
  8. chayes

    chayes New Member

    Feb 29, 2000
    Raleigh, NC
    I think Noel Kinney trumped Gus' perfomance at the DC-Kansas match Saturday night.

    Be thankful it wasn't on TV so the rest of the country was spared his so called attempts to referee a match.
     
  9. krolpolski

    krolpolski Member+

    Oh please. They showed a slow motion close up replay and Hristo's hand brushed Suarez's face and he collapsed like he had suffered an anurism. You guys were laying it on Hristo for taking a dive to get that direct kick that he buried. This dive by Suarez was far more evident.
     
  10. The Cadaver

    The Cadaver It's very quiet here.

    Oct 24, 2000
    La Cañada, CA
    Club:
    Los Angeles Galaxy
    Nat'l Team:
    United States
    No, we can also whine about them when we win. When was the last time anyone saw an MLS game where the general view was the ref did a good job.

    St. Silva is just one in a long line of bozos. You have out-of-shape Kevin Terry grinning like an imbecile as he huffs and puffs twenty-yards out of position, and then there is Richard Heron. The last game I saw him ref had fans from both teams screaming at him by the end of the game.

    Once you get past Brian Hall, there is such a drop off in the quality of officiating that it is disgraceful. Having been a season ticket holder from day 1, I can attest to the improvement in the quality of play in the league. When will the league make similar strides in officiating? At what point does the officiating become so bad that it is an impediment to recruiting players? This has been a real disappointment.
     
  11. deep-throat

    deep-throat New Member

    May 24, 2001
    Re: Re: the New "Gus St. Silva is a disgracce to soccer" thread

    Funny how before the World Cup, you couldnt find anyone on these boards with a good word to say for Brian Hall. Funny how we all seem to collectively have an awakening all at the same time!

    Lack of originality and personal opinion from BigSoccers band of critics of referees...............This is a real disappointment.
     
  12. joseph pakovits

    joseph pakovits New Member

    Apr 29, 1999
    fly-over country
    Re: Re: Re: the New "Gus St. Silva is a disgracce to soccer" thread

    Brian Hall still sucks. He's just a trifle better than that Korean ref and whoever reffed the Korea-Spain match and that's not saying much.
     
  13. Elninho

    Elninho Member+

    Sacramento Republic FC
    United States
    Oct 30, 2000
    Sacramento, CA
    Club:
    Los Angeles Galaxy
    Nat'l Team:
    United States
    Brian Hall has yet to get a bad evaluation for an international match... he was one of the better refs at the World Cup and was singled out for praise at Asian Cup 2000.

    Ricardo Valenzuela isn't bad either.
     
  14. Barca_Fan2003

    Barca_Fan2003 New Member

    Mar 30, 2002
    Slidell, LA
    What can you expect from St. Silva? He's a papist.
     
  15. dsylvest

    dsylvest Member

    Jan 18, 1999
    DC
    Hall is good...
    Kenny is mediocre on his good days...
    St. Silva is horrific on his greatest days.


    MLS referees are for shite, and should be shot at dawn.


    We should then fly in ref teams from Jamaica or T&T to officiate all of our matches.


    ...dude - pass that over here, maaaaaan...
     
  16. joseph pakovits

    joseph pakovits New Member

    Apr 29, 1999
    fly-over country
    The trouble is that the refs MLS uses are largely the same crew from 96 who were as good as they were ever gonna get back in 1996. Since then the level of play and players has improved drastically but the refs haven't so their suckitude is simply even more noticable now.


    What the league should have been doing for the last five years is working with USSF to train refs who are capable of handling Division 1 level soccer matches.

    They haven't done that, which is understandable to a certain extent as they were busy trying to grow the league. I accept that.

    The level of reffing in MLS now, however, has become simply unacceptable. They are ruining games and renderign them unwatchable with their stupidity. This makes the league look stupid to both fan and non-fan alike. MLS will not be taken seriously until non-soccer fans can stop being able to accurately say that MLS refs keep blowing way too many calls and don't even know the rules of the game.

    The league needs to get a Director of Gameday Operations who gives a flying fuck about the problem and is willing to take action. This person is not the current occupant, Mr. Machnik, who mistakenly thinks the refs are perfect and cannot be improved upon. At least, that's what he told the fans at Supporters Summit 2000 during his insulting tantrum when fans brought up the problem to him.
     
  17. deep-throat

    deep-throat New Member

    May 24, 2001
    You are, of course entitled to your opinion - it IS a free country after all.

    However, you would hope that before people would make comments on a public forum, they would make sure that they understood what they were talking about. Clearly not the case here.
     
  18. The Cadaver

    The Cadaver It's very quiet here.

    Oct 24, 2000
    La Cañada, CA
    Club:
    Los Angeles Galaxy
    Nat'l Team:
    United States
    What makes your comments dogma and Joe's comments mere opinion? Why is it so "clearly the case" that his opinion is wrong?

    (Gawd - I find myself defending a Fire fan. If that doesn't tell you how bad the refs are, I don't know what will)
     
  19. feuerfex

    feuerfex Member

    Apr 21, 2001
    And just what is it, pray tell, that clearly indicates that Joe does not understand what he is talking about?
     
  20. joseph pakovits

    joseph pakovits New Member

    Apr 29, 1999
    fly-over country
    Thank you for your vague and completely unsubstantiated reply, Mr. St. Silva.

    If Machnik can be demonstrated to have changed his opinion since the MLS Supporters Summit 2000, where he was laughed and jeered off the podium by the fans for his arrogant performance, I will stand corrected.

    The "My God, they killed (Noel) Kenny" thing is a step in the right direction and I wonder where the real impetus for it came from and why he was really told to hit the road for the rest of the year.
    However, rather than punish current refs why doesn't MLS do something demonstrable to help USSF train new and better refs and linesmen? At least that way the fans can say "OK, they're doing something to correct the problem. Let's give it time to work." If you have some 411 on such an effort, do yourself and us a favor and either give us some info or pipe down.
     
  21. MassachusettsRef

    MassachusettsRef Moderator
    Staff Member

    Apr 30, 2001
    Washington, DC
    Nat'l Team:
    United States
    Deep throat can speak for himself if he wants to (I suspect he has even more proof than I do), but I think he was basically responding to the following quote from joseph, which is incorrect:

    I posted this in the Chicago forum under a similar thread, but maybe it will do more good and be more eye-opening here. Below is a comparison of the 1998 and 2002 referee corps from MLS:

    The 1998 list:

    Rutty
    Hall
    Stott
    Kennedy
    Valenzuela
    Saheli
    Prus
    Grady
    Heron
    Terry
    Kenny (not currently active)
    Yonan (not currently active)
    Ramirez (retired)
    Tamberino (retired)
    Baharmast (retired)
    Rodhas (retired)
    Angeles (retired)
    Covaciu (retired)
    Weyland (retired)
    Sheker (retired)
    Giordano (retired)
    Hunt (WUSA)
    Lay (WUSA)

    The 2002 list:

    Rutty
    Hall
    Stott
    Kennedy
    Valenzuela
    Saheli
    Prus
    Grady
    St. Silva (2001)
    Corrie (1999)
    Vaughn (2000)
    Salazar (2001)
    Simmons (2001)
    Kokolski (2001)
    Anno (2002)
    Bazakos (2002)
    Marrufo (2002)
    Johnson (2002)
    Poeschel (2002)

    (date of first game in parentheses)

    And, as a point of info, here are the referees that have worked in 1999, 2000, or 2001, but no longer are active:

    Seitz (WUSA)
    Sill
    Quinsenberry
    Perry
    Vega
    Tsapos

    So, for what it's worth, only eight of the current twenty referees in MLS have been there since 1998, nevermind 1996 (from 96, I can remember Boulous, Olson, Dominguez from my own memory, so the turnover from 1996 is even sharper). Twelve of the twenty are relatively new, nine (45% of all MLS refs) of them having had their first referee assignment after last year's all-star break. That's pretty good evidence to refute joseph's assertion that "the refs MLS uses are largely the same crew from 96".

    It also should be noted that several referees have entered the MLS ranks after 1998 and disappeared before 2002 (the six above at minimum). In other words, when a referee truly can't hack it in the eyes of USSF and MLS, he's shown the door, as there are plenty of new, younger referees coming up the ranks through USL (as an example, Simmons had the A-League final last year). So, the argument that guys like Kenny, Corrie, etc., have a free pass and will never be reprimanded or punished when they have a poor performance is erroneous. History has proven otherwise and it's been demonstrated again with Kenny. It's just a simple matter of many fans--biased or unbiased--having A) a very different outlook from officials, adminstration, coaches, and players or B) a mentality where they'll never be happy with any referee.
     
  22. joseph pakovits

    joseph pakovits New Member

    Apr 29, 1999
    fly-over country
    Since we're having fun cross-posting, here's my response from the other thread...

    I know this which is why I said "largely the same", not "the same". Crucial difference. Obviously almost any group is going to have turnover in five years. From your own list, though, about half the 98 crew is still around (counting Kenny since he was only recently given the hook). Hunt and Lay would probably still be in MLS if it wasn't for WUSA.

    Also, most of the ones who aren't around are listed as "retired", not "fired". Is "retired" a euphemism for "fired" or did they really just quit?



    quote:
    --------------------------------------------------------------------------------

    When an MLS ref fails, as Kenny has, in the eyes of an unbiased assessor, he's punished--plain and simple. It's happened before and it will happen again. The thing is, MLS refs fail a lot less than biased fans think, they do. If you went by bigsoccer posters, you would think that Kenny has failed every match for the past 6 years. He hasn't--I believe these are the first two he has failed in MLS ever. Nonetheless, he failed, he knows the consequences, and he'll pay the price.
    --------------------------------------------------------------------------------



    The problem then is that the "failure" criteria are too easy because fans of all MLS teams agree that MLS reffing sucks to an unwarranted extent. And that's not just a case of "you made a call against my team once". I watch completely neutral games in which neither the Fire nor I, really, have absolutely the slightest interest in the outcome and the reffing still verges from the acceptable to "sucks". Games where I can honestly say "That was a very well-reffed game" are fairly rare and I'm not hesitant to point them out since it helps me not be so despondent about the league.

    Yeah yeah yeah, refs are human and make mistakes, everyone thinks their refs are worst and it happens in other leagues blah blah blah.... I know all the usual excuses. The fact remains that even for fallible humans, compared to other leagues I've watched, in MS games too many obvious fouls are missed, too many phantom fouls apparent only to the referee appear, the refs are making calls while woefully out of position, they're letting players talk them into giving cards, they're letting players encroach on free kicks, they're officiating is woefully inconsistent within the same game especially in regards to the issuance of cards and they're not even following the rules of the game (the infamous Warzycha handball situation or the Fire game where Nowak was called offsides when an opposing player headed him the ball are but two of the sillier examples).

    Also, I haven't seen some of the newer refs in action but if Gus St. Silva is anything to judge by our referee training is devolving, not improving.


    ----


    Like I said to D.T., MassRef, tell me what measures MLS is taking to work with USSF to improve the current crop of MLS refs and the training of future refs. I'd love to hear about them.
     
  23. MassachusettsRef

    MassachusettsRef Moderator
    Staff Member

    Apr 30, 2001
    Washington, DC
    Nat'l Team:
    United States
    In the interest of full cross-posting.....

    Fair enough about the "largely the same", but I'd venture a guess that no other league in the world (or, moreover, professional sports in the USA) could say that 60% of their referees officiated their first match within the past 3 years. I find that to be quite a bit of turnover. To you, saying that "about half have been there since 98" might sound like a lot--to me it doesn't, and I'm not just thinking in a soccer sense. Moreover, to my knowledge, only 5 of the current 20 referees were there in the inaugural season (that's 25% retention in 6 years). In the NHL, NFL and NBA, I can guarantee that there is a much higher retention rate. Which brings up the point that you should be thankful that MLS doesn't have to fight a referee's union like most other first divisions around the world do. If they did, no one would ever get canned, and then everyone would be really pissed.

    Secondly, Hunt may very well be in the MLS, but for a variety of reasons, I don't think Lay would.

    Finally, "retired" certainly means "retired" in the cases of Baharmast, Angeles, Tamberino and Weyland. I'm not sure about the others, but I'm pretty sure they all "retired". The ones you like to deem as "fired" are the ones I listed as no longer active, or having reffed solely between 1999 and 2001.


    Well, you have stated some of my arguments, but I have a few more.

    You may watch other leagues, but a lot of fans on here don't. The simple truth--in my mind--is that besides the EPL and Serie A, I'd take MLS refereeing over most leagues in Europe. I watch the Scottish, Spanish and Portuguese leagues regularly, and I can say unequivocally that I think MLS officiating is better--particularly the ARs. It's certainly not perfect here, but many more goals are wrongly taken away in Europe right now for incorrect offside decisions. Anyway, I'll know we're disagreeing on this point, but I truly believe what I'm saying.

    As some evidence, I point out the performances of USSF referees at FIFA competitions. Going back to 1990, American referees have been retained in the top group of officials (meaning they performed better, in most cases, than many of the best Europe had to offer). Mauro in 1990, Angeles in 1994, and, more recently, Baharmast in 1998, Hall in 2002 and 1999 (Confed Cup), Tamberino in 1999 in 1999 (U17 Cup) and Stott in 2001 (U20 Cup). Hall and Stott, in particular, have been villified at the MLS level, but have been worldclass at the World Cup level. No one else finds that strange? Stott, for example, received the Brazil/Germany--undeniably, the single best match--assignment at the WYC. FIFA, at every tournament, recognizes the level of the USA referees and it wouldn't surprise me to see Stott working a semifinal at the 2006 World Cup. Even MLS fans recognize how well Hall did at WC02 (only a year after they thought he was the worst in the league). But, for some reason, whenever these men step on the field for an MLS match, no matter what they do, they suck. You don't find that odd in any manner?


    First, St. Silva is the only one of the newest additions that can be deemed "older" (over 32). For your sake, he'll only be around for a few years. Regardless, he shouldn't be an example of where the program is going--for good or bad.

    Where the program is going is to younger referees. Referees that get their national badges at a young age (Johnson, Simmons, Bazakos, Salazar, Anno and Marrufo are all under 28, I believe) and exhibit promise are immediately being put into MLS duty as 4th officials in their first year as nationals. Even before that happens, MLS referees are being "developed" at national tournaments like the USASA Select Cup and the USYSA Nationals. At those type of tournaments, men like Tamberino, Baharmast and Klenaitis are at these tournaments and identifying talent far before the A-League or D3 level. If they find the talent (as examples, Simmons and Salazar were at the 2000 and 1999 USYSA Finals, respectively), they "fast track" it, and get it to MLS as quick as possible.
     
  24. FrenchSpic

    FrenchSpic New Member

    Jul 7, 2000
    NJ
    Gus Sucks!

    He is the worst! He has reffed several games (at least 4) of mine in the past 2 years, both in NCAA D3 and indoor soccer games. Every single time he has reffed, I have left the field fuming over the quality of his decisions. He is awful and I still cant believe he is a MLS ref. He doesn't even belong on a neighborhood indoor soccer league.
     

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