Recent content by RefIADad

Probably would have had a Champions League final if a Premier League team wasn’t almost always in it. In any case, his career is absolutely nothing to minimize. Excellent career and a really good referee.

Your first paragraph was exactly what those of us leading our officials training session Monday night said. Do not try this at home. The World Cup is a totally different game. At our level, call fouls. Issue cards to modify behavior. Keep the game safe, fair, and fun. Do not try to use the...

Thoughts on Vincic for the final? I’ll be honest, he’s never been one of my favorites. Never really seen one of his Champions League or Euro games where I’ve walked away saying “man, he nailed that game”.

Having watched the game on replay I’d say that was about as well as anyone could have expected Elfath to do. He refereed his style, which meshes well with what FIFA likes. If would have been watching live, I would have been thinking “oof, he’s one big foul from losing this game” about 20 minutes...

Not watching the game while at work, but comments here and on the US-based forum are pretty consistent. This is who Elfath is. Tries to manage players, and usually succeeds. But managing Argentina is a totally different deal. On this side of the pond, we usually laud his management skills but...

I mean, who could have seen this coming? Oh, right, anyone with an ounce of critical thinking ability………

Fair point. It took me an hour to wind down, and I was a semi-neutral (obviously not wanting to see Mexico succeed as a US fan).

I sincerely hope those of you who are England supporters get your blood pressure down and get some measure of sleep. I’ll be in your shoes in about 21 hours time as I’m writing this…….

I’m just flabbergasted that there has been a man legitimately named Dick Pound. We now return you to your regularly scheduled programming.

I just can’t get behind this, even as a US fan. It smells of something bad, and this is not how I want to see things progress. I didn’t like the send off, but this is not the way to resolve it. If this was Doku or Trossard having this done, I’d be livid as a US supporter.

It certainly is bad optics at the very least. I thought the send off was harsh, but certainly defensible and absolutely nothing warranting an overturn of the standard one-match suspension. I’d be livid if I were the officials. Damaging to their credibility.

2018-Argentina vs Croatia. Probably the most poorly-officiated game in that World Cup, and easily in the top 2 (England-Colombia being the other one). Plus, he was always vastly overrated in my opinion.

You have to wonder how much politics factored into this. Tantashev is an Uzbek, just like Ravshan Irmatov. Irmatov - who clearly had his own issues on the field in World Cups - still does a lot with FIFA. This isn't about "well, he's from a country that doesn't have a top professional league"...

This is just sad. No foul recognition, no confidence, no management ability. The penalty should have been an easy on-field call, as should a bunch of other fouls. This was simply terrible assigning. The only possible thing I can consider is Collina and his assigning team thought France would...

I thought Michael Oliver was excellent today. That was the type of match we see a lot in CONCACAF. He did a great job of dealing with things, and a game which could have been a firestorm was reasonably calm. If he ever wants to cross the pond to do a US-Honduras match in San Pedro Sula, we’ll...