One of the few certainties in soccer is players (and coaches) will not get along with referees. There will always be contentious calls and subjective decisions that could go either way. This isn’t exclusive to soccer, but there is one sport that avoids this aspect completely: ultimate Frisbee, which does not have referees. Could the beautiful game ever follow suit and institute self-officiated soccer?
Ligue 1 referee Tony Chapron has been suspended by the French Football Federation (FFF) “until further notice” following his insanely villanous actions at the end of Paris Saint-Germain’s 1-0 victory over Nantes on Sunday.
Abdoulaye Doucouré is one cheeky fella. The Watford midfielder took advantage of some poor refereeing and some poor decision-making from the English FA to help earn his team a point with a 2-2 draw. You see, the 90th-minute Doucoure goal vs Southampton was scored with the Frenchman’s hand.
Yes, it’s still illegal to use your hands if you’re not the goalie. And no, England hasn’t joined the rest of the civilized world by adopting VAR. So yeah, the goal stood, and Southampton is rightly livid.
The institution that is Arsene Wenger was handed a three-match touchline ban and a $54,250 fine for a confrontation with referee Mike Dean after Arsenal’s 1-1 draw with West Brom on Sunday. The Wenger ban is nothing new for the Frenchman, who served a four-match touchline ban for a similar behavior last year. And Wenger didn’t even deny these accusations, fully admitting to what he said and standing by his criticism.
Ever wondered how defenders in the 60s and 70s coped with Pelé, perhaps the greatest player of all time? Defending Pelé was really quite simple: They kicked the sh*t out of him. And pushed him around. And threw him to the ground. And kicked him a few dozen more times.
Pelé scored 767 goals over his storied career but he would have had more were it not for the physical play of defenders who quickly realized the only hope they had to stop Pelé was to foul him.
It’s one of the first lessons you learn playing soccer (or most any sport): play to the whistle. That tenet is even more important in the age of VAR, when professionals know the referee can consult replay to confirm goals, at least in countries that aren’t in the Dark Ages. The Mario Mandzukic goal vs. Torino was the result of Juventus punishing its rival for not playing to the whistle in the Coppa Italia quarterfinals on Wednesday.
During Sunday's Bundesliga match between Cologne and Freiburg, the referee called a penalty for Cologne. The only problem was no one could find the penalty spot. So where is it? We think we can figure it out.
Here are some suggestions for where the referee could look:
-In the couch cushions
-Under the bed
-In the garage
-In the attic
Colombia’s friendly against South Korea on Nov. 10 did not endear the South Americans to the world. Midfielder Edwin Cardona made a racist gesture to South Korean players following an embarrassing flop by James Rodriguez. We wrote then that if FIFA had any sense, Cardona would be given a lengthy ban lasting through the World Cup.
Real Madrid defender Dani Carvajal thought he was being clever. In the waning moments of a 6-0 victory over APOEL on Nov. 21, Carvajal decided to hold the ball instead of throwing it back into play. The referee didn’t like this time wasting and showed him a yellow card. It was Carvajal’s fifth yellow of the Champions League campaign, meaning he would be suspended for the Borussia Dortmund match, but he would be available for the knockout rounds, for which Real Madrid had already qualified.