Michael Oliver, the referee who took a stand and freed Narnia from the evil grasp of Sauron, returned to Premier League duty on Monday in a 1-1 draw between West Ham United and Stoke City. Okay, fine, Oliver didn’t fight any orcs or free Narnia, but the man did end Gianluigi Buffon’s dreams of winning the Champions league.
What’s a Luddite’s favorite band? Rage Against The Machine. What’s a Luddite’s favorite football league? The English Premier League.
The 20 English Premier League clubs decided against adding a VAR next season in a league vote on Friday. Instead, the league issued a statement saying it would continue testing Premier League VAR.
DO NOT SHARE WITH ANYONE OUTSIDE THE MANCHESTER CITY COACHING STAFF AND PLAYERS, THANK YOU.
-Pep
Pinky in the air
Switch to a 4-4-2.
Making a "W" with arms on top of head
Switch to a 4-2-2-2 Brazilian box.
The "Hook 'Em" sign
Switch to a 4-2-3-1.
Hands spreading apart
Play closer to each other (this is trickery).
Hands gone closer together
Spread out (this is also trickery).
Hand to ear like a telephone
Manchester City thought it had scored a second goal late in the first half against Liverpool, a goal that would have put the Citizens up 2-0 and two thirds of the way to erasing the 3-0 defeat from the first leg of their Champions League quarterfinal. But the referees thought otherwise and the disallowed Manchester City goal was a defining moment of the first half.
Paris Saint-Germain midfielder Marco Verratti has issued an apology for his sending off against Real Madrid in the Champions League, but the Italian international isn’t entirely repentant for his actions — he’s convinced German referee Felix Brych wouldn’t have shown a second yellow card to someone like Lionel Messi in the same situation.
With PSG trailing Real 4-1 on aggregate in the 66th minute, Verratti won possession back for his side outside the opponent’s box. However, with three Real players quickly surrounding him, Verratti lost the ball while screaming for a foul.
FIFA officially approved the use of video assistant referees at this summer’s World Cup during a FIFA Council meeting on Friday in Bogota, Colombia. After testing the system out at last year’s Confederations Cup, World Cup VAR is sure to annoy all the England fans who like to complain about not having anything to complain about.
Here’s a five-day period so Luis Suarez that even Luis Suarez would call it cliché. Last Tuesday, the Uruguayan striker was booked in the 76th minute of Barcelona’s 1-1 draw with Chelsea. Suarez was given the yellow directly after Lionel Messi’s equalizer for berating the linesman.
It’s rare one shares a pitch with Nigel de Jong and doesn’t come out with something bleeding, broken or bruised. Somehow, Germany referee Deniz Aytekin managed to survive offering the Dutch bad boy some candy before snarfing it down himself during a DFB Pokal match between Mainz and Eintracht Frankfurt on Wednesday.