Vancouver vs. Dallas (R)

Discussion in 'Referee' started by vetshak, Aug 16, 2012.

  1. vetshak

    vetshak Member+

    May 26, 2009
    Minnesota
    Interesting moment in this match last night, 1:50 mark of the highlight reel: http://www.mlssoccer.com/video/2012/08/16/highlights-van-vs-dal

    Free kick for VAN, Camillo smacks it into the wall. Matt Foerster catches the handling offense, but gives a FK just outside the PA.

    I was lucky enough to be at the game (on vacation in the Pacific Northwest, taking my kids to their first MLS games). The big screen showed the handling offense, but the problem was the site of the restart. I can honestly say this is a rare situation where magic spray is a significant drawback.

    It's the third guy from the outside in the wall that commits the handling violation. Look at where he is standing at the taking of the kick... inside the PA. The 10 yard line is drawn with most of it in the PA. I think Foerster initially gives the PA (he is walking towards the goal line after calling it, then seems to change his mind).

    The problem is, with the magic spray, it's hard to sell this is outside the PA. The player is standing behind the line and is clearly in the PA at the taking of the kick. If he moves outside the area in the millisecond between when the ball is struck and making contact with it, OK, but we know that's pretty unlikely. Either he handled inside the PA or he failed to respect the required distance. The magic spray really doesn't leave any room for error here.

    Foerster really mucked the sell of this decision up. It took a minute before anybody in the stadium (including the players) had any idea what he was calling. His AR on that side popped his flag when the deflection crossed the goal line to call a corner kick, then looked confused himself, then you could see the RefTalk kick in and the AR nod his head and touch his arm. But then it looked like Foerster asked him in or out, and of course he was well inside the PA (even with the 2toL) at the kick and would have had no idea.

    I think if Foerster initially just went to the spot outside the PA and signaled for a DFK, while replay would have suggested he was wrong, the sell of the call would have looked better. What he did looked really wishy washy. He cost himself a lot of respect with the players, and for the night was rather inconsistent in dealing with Dallas' delay tactics after they went ahead. I think that had a lot to do with a final card count of 9 yellows, one blowup in front of the benches (that led to Ferreria justly being booked for his antics), and my kids being introduced to the heartwarming chants from the Southsiders of "F%$k you Dallas!" and "Ref you suck!"
     
  2. jayhonk

    jayhonk Member+

    Oct 9, 2007
    The fudge (and the spray) wasn't the problem here. The lack of clarity was. The CR heads to the spot, and realizes that he is the only one thinking penalty kick. So he mentally reevaluates the 'facts' regarding the location of the foul. Very messy 'sell'.

    The location outside the box may actually have been accurate--the wall player rotates his arm toward the ball, moving it into the field of play outside the penalty area. That, combined with a half step toward the ball, theres a good chance the contact was outside the area...?
     
  3. gosellit

    gosellit BigSoccer Supporter

    May 10, 2005
    It does look like Matt is communicating to someone, presumably the AR. He then talks to Kevin Hartman, who looks like he understands and moves back to his line to set up for another DK.
     
  4. JimEWrld

    JimEWrld Member

    Jun 20, 2012
    Club:
    Chicago Fire
    Looking at the replays, the handling call was made on the middle right defender. If you watch his feet, he starts on the line of the PA and then takes a step forward before contact is made. I would say pretty confidently that the ball was outside the box when it was handled. Unfortunately it was a poor sell by the referee. It also didn't help as he was one of the few to actually see it.
     
  5. DudsBro

    DudsBro Member

    Jan 12, 2010
    Club:
    Manchester United FC
    Nat'l Team:
    England
    Welcome to the Great White North Vetshak......see, we don't all live in igloos ;)

    On the play in question, it took me a moment to figure out what Foerster was calling as well. To be honest, I'm not sure if it needed to be called, especially considering the Vancouver players were not calling for it (which, on a potential handball PK situation, indicates the probably thought nothing of it). Regardless, since he did: on the replay (sitting at home with my TV) I felt the offence occurred outside the PA. As a previous poster said, the defender moved forward. Now, in that case, why not the booking..... Ah, the downside of the magic spray.....

    And now I'll copy over my post from the MLS thread...

    Foerster has lost the plot a little bit at the end. Bust up after a foul on Ferreria. Crew sorts it out well, but 3 bookings come out - one for the foul, two for the extracurricular activities. Yet somehow the 3rd guy into the confrontation - who escalated it - escapes a card. Then in the last 10 minutes (5 + 5 stoppage) there is a ridiculous amount of gamesmanship, and poor management of it. Lots of players coming in late on a dead ball situation to kick the ball away, no cards and no effective management of it. [This had been happening before, without good managing, but it just skyrocketed] Temperature just keeps on shooting up with various little things, and Foerster doesn't seem to recognize it. Camilo gets away with a hard two handed push after he commits a foul. Also a Dallas player grabs the shoulders/neck of a VAN player and throws him to the ground without even a talking to. Then a odd booking right at the end for a 'Caps player kicking the ball after he can't keep it from going over the goal line. Technically correct for sure, but considering what else happened in the past 10....
    Before the 86' minute (the first bust up), I felt Foerster was doing very well. Perhaps should have cautioned Davidson (VAN) sooner for PI, but apart from that definitely a good job in calling the game and managing the players. However, he seemed to lose it a bit in the last 10 - I wonder if the mass confrontation jolted his mind out of gear a bit.​
     
  6. MassachusettsRef

    MassachusettsRef Moderator
    Staff Member

    Apr 30, 2001
    Washington, DC
    Nat'l Team:
    United States
    This seems like a very interesting question.

    Let's presume a similar hypothetical scenario, just to take away the specific debates about this one.

    Free kick 30 yards out, so the wall is 20 yards out (and not in the penalty area). Player moves forward and handles to block the ball. Presume the handling is in no way considered tactical. Which do you punish? Do you give a card for the failure to respect the distance and re-do the free kick or do you give a new DFK 21 or 22 yards out for the handling? For some reason, the obvious answer to me is give the closer DFK. But...

    What if the defender in question was already on a yellow card?
     
  7. rkucenski

    rkucenski Member

    Sep 23, 2011
    Flower Mound TX
    Club:
    FC Dallas
    In your hypothetical where the wall is 20 yards out, defender moves forward and handles the ball (not tactically). If the ball immediately moves from the handling to an attacker one could easily apply advantage and come back at the next stoppage and book the misconduct of failing to respect the distance, correct?

    If that is correct, then in your original hypothetical wouldn't you take the more serious of the two offenses (DFK 9 yards closer) and still caution the failure to respect distance? Not saying it would be an easy sell.

    To me, it didn't look like the defender encroached more than a step or so before the ball was played. Wouldn't that go along the thinking of typically giving the keeper a step on a PK? Even if the defender was sitting on one yellow in the Dallas game, I don't think a caution was warrented. Now if he took 3-4 steps in....
     
  8. DudsBro

    DudsBro Member

    Jan 12, 2010
    Club:
    Manchester United FC
    Nat'l Team:
    England
  9. bluetooner

    bluetooner Member

    Nov 7, 2008
    Carteret NJ
    Club:
    Philadelphia Union
    Nat'l Team:
    Scotland

    Most interesting is the announcement of it a few hours before the next game - surely it could have been made earlier (heard it was for kicking the ball at the ref?) as it was pretty much guaranteed - or even after the game for the next one? (don't know if that is allowed). Timing of it is what apparently makes the decision controversial.
     
  10. Sport Billy

    Sport Billy Member+

    May 25, 2006
    I thought it was excellently handled.
    On first impression it appeared inside the box.
    As such the CR went towards the spot.

    Pretty clear that it was outside the box.
    [​IMG]

    Picked up by an AR and wisely communicated to the CR who correctly brings it outside the box.
    The communication is clear.
    [​IMG]

    Excellent catch by the AR.
     
  11. vetshak

    vetshak Member+

    May 26, 2009
    Minnesota
    Sorry, in the midst of my vacation (I was in Seattle today at Sounders-Caps, I'm sure Petrescu is getting vilified somewhere on these threads; on the other hand, my friend from Seattle asked me to keep going to Vancouver games so they can keep losing 2-0 every time.) I haven't checked the thread recently.

    Going back to my OP, I really didn't care too much one way whether the handling was in or out. I just found it interesting that the magic spray creates a conundrum. As with MassRef's hypothetical, it really does create some new quandaries.

    Billy, I don't know who talked Foerster out of giving the PK on the play, but it was not the lead AR. He never saw the handling. He had gone to the goal line and signaled for a corner kick when Hartman pinned the ball on the ground. He was as confused as everybody else on the field. While everybody else at the game was watching Foerster and the confused Dallas defenders, I was watching the AR to see if he had called something. After about five seconds he nodded and tapped his arm, as if to say he understood that the ball had been handled. He did not call the handling, and with the crowd of players inside the PA, he never would have known if the handling was in or out of the PA.

    Foerster didn't appear to actually signal for a PK at all... he may have been asking for help, then realized his AR couldn't help him, and then put the ball outside the PA. Or maybe he got help from the 4th.

    DudsBro, I was in agreement with you on how this match played out. The last 20 minutes were really frustrating to watch. Dallas' gamesmanship throughout the whole match was pretty awful.

    At one point in the 1st half Vancouver had a free kick just inside the halfway line and Ferreira went and stood right in front of the ball. The Vancouver defender appealed for help from Foerster, saw he wasn't watching, and then drilled the ball into the back of Ferreria from a yard away. Vancouver played the ball out of the touch, but it just never got dealt with.

    Once Dallas got the lead, Foerster never punished a single Dallas player for delay, but there was an AWFUL lot of it. The 86th minute mass confrontation came because Davidson hacked down Ferreira from behind on a breakout (a legitimate caution for a tactical foul) right in front of the benches... Ferreira began rolling around on the ground and Davidson got in his face and yelled at him to get up, to which Ferreira miraculously popped up and got in Davidson's face. Ferreira was properly cautioned for UB at that point, but the whole thing happened because Foerster had been letting all of the Dallas players delay restarts for the previous 15 minutes. I really believed he could have cut his card count from 9 to about 5 if he had just dealt one for delay sometime earlier... there was a lot of frustration on that field.

    Which is also what led to Robson being suspended for today's game. I have to say, that last card was the worst of the nine. After all of the gaming that Dallas had gotten away with, Robson got upset about a possession decision from the SAR and slammed the ball into the signboards... unfortunately very near the SAR. OK, call it dissent, but the card looked absolutely ludicrous after all of the other junk that the Dallas players had gotten away with. I recall at the time thinking the DC might take a look at it because the SAR was so close by, but at the time I just saw a frustrated player at his wits' end, and I don't think he was targeting the SAR.

    On one hand, I do understand the DC's action because they have been somewhat consistent in suspending players for any action that comes close to the officials this year (Shea, Beckham). But again, there was a ton of frustration on that field that had come as a result of Dallas players getting away with gamesmanship.

    If anybody has the subscription, I encourage them to watch the last 20 minutes of the match. It's a pretty interesting case study in refereeing. I think Foerster was punishing things he saw and doing the right thing, but you will see a lot of stuff that he elected to deal with in other ways that, in the end, were not particularly effective and indirectly raised the temperature of the match. Let's just say he had lots of options, and the ones he chose did not positively affect the match, unfortunately.
     
  12. RedStar91

    RedStar91 Member+

    Sep 7, 2011
    Club:
    FK Crvena Zvezda Beograd
    From the games I have seen in MLS, it just seems like there is a league wide policy of referees hesitating to give "technical" yellow cards for non-foul offenses. You rarely see cards for FDR, DR or DT at all like in Europe. Goal keepers almost never get booked for time wasting and it seems like referees just don't want to deal with it and caution it.

    Granted booking a goal keeper or any player for time wasting in the 88th minute really doesn't accomplish anything for that particular game it still adds to a players caution total and it might force them to miss a game.
     

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