World Cup 2010 - discussions & random thoughts

I agree with this. I would much rather lose when the other team is simply better than to have the game decided by a blown call or the like. I may be a relative neophyte in soccer, but it certainly looked to me like the better team won.

To be totally honest, I think the US did better than what a lot of people expected. I never thought they would win their group to begin with, and so anything from that point on would have been gravy.

That said, you couldn't ask for a better matchup in the knockout stage. Ghana is a solid team, but they aren't in the same league as Germany, Brazil, or Argentina. Heck, the 2nd round opponent would have been Uruguay, and even that was a game that the US could have won.

ESPN will continue to carry it, pretty much because they have to. They already have sold commercial time to a lot of companies, and let's face it, what other sport can they put on TV in the last week of June and first week of July? There's no basketball, hockey, or football in the summer, and it's not like it's the baseball playoffs or anything...

Things this ignorant American still doesn't understand about soccer:

1. The clock. I don't understand why it cannot be like every other sport and have it stop on a penalty, injury etc., and then restart when play resumes. It would seem to be ever so much more practical to have everyone involved in the match know exactly when it is going to end.

2. The clock. Why the hell does it count upwards from zero? This is almost as annoying is it not stopping during obvious times when it should stop. Bad enough that you don't know exactly when the match is going to end, but why the heck would you display how much of the match is over, as opposed to how much of the match is left? Is that part of the allure - because you aren't supposed to know when the match is over?

3. The refs. I have to admit that I don't watch nearly enough international soccer to know if this is typical, but it seems the officiating in several matches has been terrible. In all of the major sports in the US, the refs that performed the best during the regular season are the only ones that officiate in the playoffs. Not only are the best teams playing, but the best refs are out there too. I would like to think that what I have seen up to this point is not the best the world has to offer in terms of soccer officials.

4. Lack of replay. This is a follow-up for #3. If you have incompetent referees, it would seem to be a really good idea for you to implement some kind of system to make sure the calls are correct. The Germany-England game was a classic example - while I doubt it would have affected the final outcome, any official could have determined that it was a bad call within seconds of reviewing the tape. They could even consider stopping the clock during the review.

I understand that you couldn't review everything - that would make the game too long. But what would be the problem with reviewing goals when there is some doubt? That's what they do in hockey - the only thing that can be reviewed is goal/not a goal plays. Since the average WC match has about two goals scored a game, this wouldn't lengthen the match time by much.

5. The shootout. It seems to me that soccer has it entirely backwards in this regard. It should be the Group matches that have a shootout - not the elimination matches. Call me a purist, but it seems like in an elimination game, you should win or lose by playing soccer - not something like a shootout, which is decidedly NOT soccer. Go win the match by continuing to play until a goal is scored. There are no shootouts in hockey during the playoffs. In baseball, they don't go to a homerun derby when the game is tied after 9 innings. Football (American) does not have a field goal competition to decide the winner when the game is tied after regulation time. What gives?

5b. The shootout. Relative to the size of the goalie, the goal in soccer is very big. The goalie basically has to guess where the ball is going to go before it is even kicked if he has any hope of stopping the ball. It is uterrly amazing to me that there are just as many misses during a shootout due to the shot bouncing off one of the goal posts, or missing the goal entirely as opposed to the goalie making a save. Your priotity should be getting the shot on goal, as the goalie is probably going to jump the wrong way anyhow. Most of the shots are aimed at one of the four corners of the goal, and so 3/4 of the time, the goalie is going to guess wrong. Put the shot on net for the love of god!

 

Oh, the whole "human element" arguement is non-sensical to me. We use technology to make our lives easier.

 

The main argument is that should they introduce goal-line technology / replays that there would be a sudden clamour to correct other 'injustices' using the replay. Suddenly, games decided by a very dodgy penalty decision would result in massive outcry for a replay of incident... then it will be 'was that a corner?', 'who's throw in was that?' and the game would become incredibly 'stop-start'. FIFA want a game to run as smooth as possible.

The only way I can see past this is to introduce an appeal system where each team gets 3 or so appeals per game to use... but I honestly can not see that system working for football. It would ruin the game.

 

But that was the same arguement that was used against reply in the NFL, NBA, NHL, and MLB. The games haven't seen a massive increase in time it takes to play. You just have to set limits on what can and what cannot be reviewed. To use one of your examples, none of the sports allow replay review of an official calling a penalty. (If that was the case this world cup, the US non-goal against Slovenia would still not have counted, because you wouldn't review a penalty call.)

Oh, wait, that reminds me - there's one more thing to add to my list:

6. Penalties. This is the ultimate WTF for me. A FIFA official is not required to tell the players on the offending team what the penalty was for, nor who the penalty was on. That's the only sport I'm aware of where this happens. In every other sport, if there's a foul, the referee announces what the infraction was and the player (usually identified by number) who committed it.

 

It's generally totally obvious what a penalty is for... in fact, I've never seen a pentalty called and not been able to tell why. The ref's generally send complaining players away as they will argue and argue about it... once a decision is made, that's it.

 

What was the call on the apparently game winning goal in the US-Slovenia game that was dissallowed? I mean, if it's usually obvious, why was it so controversial?

 

That was not a penalty decision, it was a disallowed goal.

 

This technology works wonders in rugby, it is a simple question "was that a goal?" the purpose is to decide nothing other then whether points were scored, it doesnt matter if a player was offside or if a ball was passed forward, the only thing the video ref can do is answer that question "yes" or "no"

how can you stop-start football anymore then it does now? football is far from smooth

you answered this later:

once a decision is made, that is it, you wont have a replay of the incident anymore then you would now with the replay footage.

 

I'm pro technology in football... but I am 'anti' players surrounding and bothering the referee demanding this and that. If I was a ref I would yellow any player for dissent as soon as they got in my face.

 

You're playing semantics here. It was disallowed because of a perceived infraction by the US.

Right - you have to set it up in such a way where there are specific parameters for what is/isn't reviewable. All sports do this. To use American football as an example, a play where a touchdown was scored can be reviewed, or a call of whether or not a receiver caught the ball with both feet in bounds can be reviewed. But you cannot review a judgement call by a referee for incidental versus pass interference on an intended receiver. Basically, you can review stuff where there is video evidence that you can look to, and determine definitively what the correct call is. There's a line in front of the goal in soccer. A replay would show definitively whether or not the ball crossed the line.

There's a work around for that too. In most US sports, it's not the referees on the field that make a decision to review a call. There is an additional referee in a both with access to the replays, and the refs have beepers. With the beepers goes off, it indicates for the on-field officials to stop play for a review.

 

Yes, but it's not a penalty unless the foul is in your own box. Otherwise it's just a foul.

That's not acceptable for football. It would make the game a lot less interesting for the spectators at the game. I would hate that.

 

I agree, that would be too far... though I find that it would be hard to make football less interesting then it already is

The refs in football are wusses, in rugby the ref penalises the team for that kind of crap, for example, making them move back 10 yards

 

I know, FIFA should take a look at rugby union in terms of showing respect to referees, and the punishments if you overstep your mark.

 

If we'd scored one more goal, we would have topped the Group! As it is, we finished higher than Italy, the current world champs, and we lost less games than England and Germany. We're holding our heads pretty high!

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I agree - whiny soccer players should be instantly marched 5 metres down the field. That would soon shut them up.

 

You'll have to forgive me for using the words "penalty" and "foul" interchangably. Of all the major sports in the US, some use the word "foul" (like basketball), and some use "penalty" (like ice hockey). But none of the sports that are regularly watched in the US have both fouls and penalties with different meanings attached to them. As I said, the terms are used interchangably. To tell the truth, when I was watching the WC games on TV, it never occurred to me that there was a difference in the two terms. I certainly heard the announcers using the different terms, but not for a minute did I think the terms held very different meanings.

But regardless of whether it's a penalty or a foul, the referee is not required to tell the players what the penalty/foul was or who committed it. So the question comes again, what was the obvious foul that was committed by the US in the end of the Slovenia game that caused the referee to disallow the goal?

OK, but there are other options. In baseball the umpires on the field make the decision to review the replay to determine if the ball was a home run or just foul. The NBA has a replay official on the side of the court to determine if end of half shots beat the buzzer. In the NFL, there is a guy on a video monitor off the field that can communicate with the officials. In the NHL, the referees review the video themselves to determine if there was a goal scored.

The larger point is that nearly every other sport has incorporated replay review in some capacity, with the purpose being to get the call right. Most people will tolerate a delay if it results in a better officiated contest. You'll have to give me something that is unique to soccer that would not allow replay to be implemented. Players arguing with the referee is insufficient reason, because that happens in all sports. For example, American basketball players always argue with the refs when calls don't go their way.

 

Don't you mean 44 years? Hasn't it been the same story every World Cup since 1966?

 

It follows the conventions of the main sports I'm used to, so it's a regional thing I guess. By having a continous clock, as opposed to one that only runs during play, it means that you do know exactly when it will end in relation to the hour of the day (bar the minute differences in injury time played). I know if I start watching a game at 3 it will be over around 4.50 including the half time break.

It's also much easier for the referee to keep track of in a game where a lot of the breaks are tiny and not discrete. Not an issue at the world cup but it would be at your local U-8 match.

Refs are just bad/ have a tough job. It's a fast field sport where it's hard to keep up with the action. They're roughly the best out there.

Another big point that FIFA like to make is that the rules of soccer are currently the exact same whether you're in a world cup final or at a local U-8 match. It's a nice thought but I can't say I'm that bothered myself.

Soccer doesn't necessarily stop when an incident occurs, unlike a lot of other sports. If an attack breaks down it's a good counter attacking opportunity. I remember an England Italy match where both teams hit the post within a space of less than 10 seconds. If you stopped play after the first one the second wouldn't have happened.

My main issue is that a lot of the debating points aren't clear cut. Obvious examples of whether the ball crossed the line or not are rare, unlike tennis or rugby. The much more common scenario is a player falling down easily in the box where he was slightly touched but not enough to send him tumbling. Should a penalty be given? Hard to say even after multiple viewings.

Shootouts aren't ideal but the game has to end sometime and it's such a low scoring sport just leaving the teams play could go on forever and it'd quickly just be a case of stamina. Replays would be ideal and were used in the early days but would be impossible to schedule in modern times. Even if you did force them to play the winners would probably be too tired to win their next match. You're probably getting a false impression of how often they occur from watching the World Cup. Ireland has only ever been in one. And the domestic leagues that make up the bulk of the footall calendar obviously don't need to use them.

If you concentrate on hitting the goal generally rather than the corners than the keeper won't guess. He'll just wait as if the shot is more central he'll be able to save it without guessing early. Really though shoot outs are more a test of nerves than skill per se (not that skill hurts). I'm sure you've seen golfers fall apart when a major is on the line despite them being able to hit shots like that blindfolded normally. And a World Cup penalty shoot out with the hopes of your team and your nation resting a single kick by you is probably one of the most high pressure moments in sport. The players talk a lot about how long and lonely the walk from the centre circle to the penalty spot is.

 

I believe all the teams that won their sections won their match, except one

I don't even think Ser Pounce-a-lot can help me now.