The Ref Stop

Wolves vs Coventry

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RustyRef

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An incident in this one that sums up the lengths teams will go to these days to get a tactical advantage. Around 12 minutes into the first half and Wolves had a corner, before it could be taken their keeper, Jose Sa, went down injured. Gary O'Neill got most of his players over and was showing them tactics on the iPad, you could see Sa looking over at the bench and the very second O'Neill walked away he tapped the physio on the shoulder and jumped up. He even gave a hand up to the female physio who had been sat on the floor treating him. It was so obvious that it was rehearsed, Coventry had unexpectedly started with a back 4 rather than a 3 and Wolves were getting totally overrun. I've seen this in other games as well, but not as blatant as this.

There needs to be a law change to prevent this. Perhaps players can't go to the technical areas during an injury break, or managers and coaches have to remain seated as players are being treated.
 
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The Ref Stop
Wolf_Ref said:
Even as a wolves fan - agree with VAR call. Not clear enough to disallow the goal.
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Agree, despite checking for almost 5 minutes they had no way of being sure whether it hit his arm or shoulder. Semedo perhaps a bit fortunate not to see red, I wasn't sure at first how much contact there was but O'Hare had clearly broken his nose. Once I saw the injury I was expecting to see a review as his foot was very high and he went into the challenge with a lot of force.

Fantastic game, especially for neutrals.
 
Also as a Wolves fan, I am (naturally) biased but I do blame the VAR check for us losing the game. I get that it wasn't clear where it hit the arm, but checking for 5 minutes and then reaching the same decision is ridiculous, and ultimately cost us the game as Coventry scored 2 really late goals to win it. IMHO, there needs to be a time limit on VAR checks.
 
RustyRef said:
An incident in this one that sums up the lengths teams will go to these days to get a tactical advantage. Around 12 minutes into the first half and Wolves had a corner, before it could be taken their keeper, Jose Sa, went down injured. Gary O'Neill got most of his players over and was showing them tactics on the iPad, you could see Sa looking over at the bench and the very second O'Neill walked away he tapped the physio on the shoulder and jumped up. He even gave a hand up to the female physio who had been sat on the floor treating him. It was so obvious that it was rehearsed, Coventry had unexpectedly started with a back 4 rather than a 3 and Wolves were getting totally overrun. I've seen this in other games as well, but not as blatant as this.

There needs to be a law change to prevent this. Perhaps players can't go to the technical areas during an injury break, or managers and coaches have to remain seated as players are being treated.
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May have seemed rehearsed but might not have been. Sa has struggled with injuries the last 2 games (Newcastle and Fulham).
 
Gabriel said:
Also as a Wolves fan, I am (naturally) biased but I do blame the VAR check for us losing the game. I get that it wasn't clear where it hit the arm, but checking for 5 minutes and then reaching the same decision is ridiculous, and ultimately cost us the game as Coventry scored 2 really late goals to win it. IMHO, there needs to be a time limit on VAR checks.
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That's nonsense. The VAR check was after 53 minutes, you conceded two further goals almost 40 minutes later. Both teams got 9 minutes added time, partially as a result of that check.

The on-pitch decision was goal. VAR couldn't find any clear evidence that he had handled the ball so obviously the decision stays as a goal. Even if there was a time limit the outcome would still have been exactly the same, goal. Given that Wolves should arguably have had a straight red card for Semedo I would say they got more than the rub of the green.
 
RustyRef said:
An incident in this one that sums up the lengths teams will go to these days to get a tactical advantage. Around 12 minutes into the first half and Wolves had a corner, before it could be taken their keeper, Jose Sa, went down injured. Gary O'Neill got most of his players over and was showing them tactics on the iPad, you could see Sa looking over at the bench and the very second O'Neill walked away he tapped the physio on the shoulder and jumped up. He even gave a hand up to the female physio who had been sat on the floor treating him. It was so obvious that it was rehearsed, Coventry had unexpectedly started with a back 4 rather than a 3 and Wolves were getting totally overrun. I've seen this in other games as well, but not as blatant as this.

There needs to be a law change to prevent this. Perhaps players can't go to the technical areas during an injury break, or managers and coaches have to remain seated as players are being treated.
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I think a law change would be too messy in terms of enforcement. A competition rule change should be sufficient to discourage this: retrospective bans, fines etc. similar to teams failing to control player behaviour.
 
JamesL said:
I mean you are kind of proving the point. I guess whilst Sa has been "struggling with injuries" no one got tactical instructions... 👀
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I was thinking the same. Somewhat miraculous that keepers get injured with no one anywhere near them, one last week even claimed to have cramp. How can a keeper possibly get cramp?
 
Really struggling to see how this didn't result in at least the referee being sent to the screen to have a look. The blow was glancing, but he is well off the floor, his foot is very high, and it clearly broke O'Hare's nose.

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I had a similar incident in a Sunday league game recently.

A team who had no subs had their midfielder sustain a blood injury, and I asked him to leave the field for treatment (and to replace his blood stained jersey). The captain insisted that I was required to stop the game as "we don't have any subs" - a request I denied.

Lo and behold, in the next break in play, their goalkeeper goes down with an "injury" to his arm - which miraculously seemed to clear up the very moment his teammate returned to the FOP with a clean jersey and the bleeding stopped.

The opposition wasn't happy at this skullduggery, but I'm not sure what else I could have done differently in that scenario.
 
sunnycrofter said:
I had a similar incident in a Sunday league game recently.

A team who had no subs had their midfielder sustain a blood injury, and I asked him to leave the field for treatment (and to replace his blood stained jersey). The captain insisted that I was required to stop the game as "we don't have any subs" - a request I denied.

Lo and behold, in the next break in play, their goalkeeper goes down with an "injury" to his arm - which miraculously seemed to clear up the very moment his teammate returned to the FOP with a clean jersey and the bleeding stopped.

The opposition wasn't happy at this skullduggery, but I'm not sure what else I could have done differently in that scenario.
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He can only return to the field of play when YOUR happy, not when hes changed his shirt.
You can simply delay that return if you feel a bit of "sh*thousery" has happened to bypass your authority.
 
Torturous listening to VAR dominated commentary on the radio on the way to my game yesterday. I turned it off half way there
 

RustyRef said:
That's nonsense. The VAR check was after 53 minutes, you conceded two further goals almost 40 minutes later. Both teams got 9 minutes added time, partially as a result of that check.

The on-pitch decision was goal. VAR couldn't find any clear evidence that he had handled the ball so obviously the decision stays as a goal. Even if there was a time limit the outcome would still have been exactly the same, goal. Given that Wolves should arguably have had a straight red card for Semedo I would say they got more than the rub of the green.
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I did say I was biased. But to be fair, how you can say this isn't handball is beyond me.
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Gabriel said:
Also as a Wolves fan, I am (naturally) biased but I do blame the VAR check for us losing the game. I get that it wasn't clear where it hit the arm, but checking for 5 minutes and then reaching the same decision is ridiculous, and ultimately cost us the game as Coventry scored 2 really late goals to win it. IMHO, there needs to be a time limit on VAR checks.
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Must have missed the part where VAR told Wolves they had to stop defending after the 95th minute
 
ladbroke8745 said:
Stills don't really help. But does it not hit the "sleeve" making it legal as that is where they're drawing the line between handball and not handball.
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I think it may hit his actual arm as you can't see it so it must be behind the ball, hitting it.
 
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