2012 London Olympics Thread

[GFB]

Some more referee theory on the time-wasting call... This is from another referee:

My own personal opinion (not at all anything that I would speak as the Official Word) is you don't make this call. Ever.

There are so many ways to handle this other than invoking the rule. I've been teaching late summer clinics to 12-15 year olds for the past 4 weeks, and when the 6-second rule pops up on the Powerpoint, I tell everybody in the room:

1) At 6 seconds, tell the keeper to play the ball.

2) Wait 2 seconds.

3) Tell the keeper to play the ball again.

4) Wait 2 seconds.

5) At this point, only if the keeper doesn't look like they are about to punt/throw/roll/drop the ball, NOW you can make the call.

And don't you dare do this to a team that is losing or tied (unless the tied team somehow benefits from the result in the standings).

If the keeper holds the ball long the next time, same process.

On the third time, buzz the keeper and say, "You have 6 seconds starting now." Now you have permission to make the call, when you can count 7 full seconds from when the keeper stands up to the beginning of the motion to release the ball.

If you manage this situation properly, you will never get to a third time.

If the keeper is holding the ball too long, you need to recognize and deal with it, but that doesn't mean you have to award an IFK inside the PA. Understand the gravity of the punishment... you are giving a team a GOLDEN scoring chance. In this case, in a one goal game with 12 minutes left. If your decision is going to result in this, it had better be because you are enforcing something that either (a) you have given plenty of forewarning about or ( is plain to see deserving of resulting in that scoring chance.

That's my unofficial position.

Pretty ridiculous IMO that it was called as the goalie was punting the ball back into play. The 6-second rule is not an NBA shotclock.

[NEW.ERA]

Tremendous effort. Shi**y way for it to end.

How so? It ended in open play at the last possible second. You can't script a better ending. It certainly is way better than it going to PK's. THAT is a :censored:ty way for a game to end.

Great game by both teams.

By losing it with pretty much one second left of added time. That really is the dagger in the heart.

Yeah, and the Canadian players hitting our players hard like it was hockey and not getting called for it was totally fair. You lost. Get over it.

Let them talk. Our medal count speaks for itself.

Who cares. Wow the US and China are going to finish with 100 medals. GRATZ!!!!! Everyone expected that.

I get in the Winter, they're are wonderful stories, but you're a lot more likely to see those amazing stories in the Summer. I like being to name everyone of our medalists, and love to see the attention each and every one of our athletes get Win or Lose in the media. It makes winning that one more medal even more sweet then it already is.

[Evil Doctor]

Yeah, and the Canadian players hitting our players hard like it was hockey and not getting called for it was totally fair. You lost. Get over it.

Talk about your sore winners....

[Evil Doctor]

Yeah, and the Canadian players hitting our players hard like it was hockey and not getting called for it was totally fair. You lost. Get over it.

Once again it is meaningless to everyone else in the world now. Believe what you want. But if the world agreed, match fixing allegations would not be happening in outlets around the world if they did not agree.

The USOC has been caught bribing people before, completely not trust worthy.

Excuse me? Are you seriously insinuating that the United States bribed the referee? Yes, I'm sure the referee had plenty to do with the US scoring all of their goals. There were horrible calls on Rapinoe's two goals and on Morgan's. Oh, wait, there weren't. "Bad" calls on 25% of the US goals =/= a crooked referee. You got beat and to claim bribery is the surest mark of a sore loser. Maybe if someone other than Sinclair had stepped up with their A game, you would have won.

I doubt that the Americans would bribe someone, but it doesn't mean there wasn't a match fix going on. It is entirely within the realm of possibility that a bunch of crooked European gamblers put a bunch on the Americans to win, and bribed the Norwegian ref to make sure it happened. Match fixing is a huge problem with European soccer and it wouldn't be a surprise if it infected the Olympics (like a the magnitude of other cheats going on).

It wasn't just the that one play that involved a bad call, there fouls being charged to the Canadians when one wasn't committed, balls going out with the American last to touch but being ruled an American, Americans not being called for fouls and infraction. It would be so bad if it was going both ways, but it wasn't...

[JQK]

The Canadian goalie was warned several times for time-wasting. She pushed the envelope, got caught, and she cost her team.

The End.

[evanmaldonado]

Now it's the end on that

[crashcarson15]

I think it's kind of funny that the same group of people that did nothing but bitch about the referee from the USMNT's 2010 WC match against Slovenia are doing nothing but telling those bitching about yesterday's referee to shut-up.

You never, ever make that call. Ever. Just all-around poor refereeing.

[NJTank]

Wow did the refs just screw over the USA women in Water Polo

[NEW.ERA]

Wow did the refs just screw over the USA women in Water Polo

Did Doc Emerick throw a fit?

[NEW.ERA]

I think it's kind of funny that the same group of people that did nothing but bitch about the referee from the USMNT's 2010 WC match against Slovenia are doing nothing but telling those bitching about yesterday's referee to shut-up.

You never, ever make that call. Ever. Just all-around poor refereeing.

USA, USA.....

Those people have bad memories. It was two bad calls in a row, she did a bad job reffing, Canada lost. Nothing we can do now.

[The_Admiral]

Wow did the refs just screw over the USA women in Water Polo

Did Doc Emerick throw a fit?

Against the sport a travesty this is!

And wow that was the most involved women's soccer discussion I've ever seen here.

[TFoA]

The six-seconds call was ridiculous, but people can stop screaming "OMG USA BIAS" when this went uncarded when it should've been a straight red.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JmncqLmy66o

The ref was bad on both sides. It happens. Lord knows the USMNT has experienced this time & time again.

[bosrs1]

Congrats the the Mexico soccer team! Very convincing win this morning coming back and scoring 3 goals after going down 1-0 early.

[crashcarson15]

Don't be surprised when Mexico's in the WC Semis in Brazil in two years. Sigh.

[NEW.ERA]

Good to see at least one other team out of CONCACAF starting to make waves.

Also. I've always had an issue with FIFA rarely ever admitting when they were wrong, especially about shoddy officiating. Now could be some suspensions handed to Canadian coaches and players that complained. Link

This as well.

U.S. forward Abby Wambach revealed Tuesday that she subtly lobbied for the call by counting out loud when McLeod had the ball.

[-kj]

...as if no one's ever lobbied for a call ever? How dare she!

[Billy B]

This as well.

U.S. forward Abby Wambach revealed Tuesday that she subtly lobbied for the call by counting out loud when McLeod had the ball.

Nothing wrong with that. Happens all the time with coaches/players doing that in basketball. In fact, you're probably a lot less likely to get that call if you don't let the ref know that you care they're taking that long.

[Kevin W.]

Also. I've always had an issue with FIFA rarely ever admitting when they were wrong, especially about shoddy officiating. Now could be some suspensions handed to Canadian coaches and players that complained. Link

Nothing wrong with that. You get cautioned for dissenting on the field so there should be consequences if you run your mouth off the field after the game - in addition to before, like the Canadian coach did. He really should have just kept his mouth shut. Illegal tactics? Tell your players to stop hitting like they're playing hockey and then we can talk about illegal tactics.

This as well.

U.S. forward Abby Wambach revealed Tuesday that she subtly lobbied for the call by counting out loud when McLeod had the ball.

So bringing a rule violation by the goalie to the ref's attention is a crime now?

[STL FANATIC]

I'd probably be pissed if I was Canadian. I've seen the US Men and Women burned badly by awful refs enough to simultaneously feel bad for Canada and also not feel too terrible if things broke the US's way.

Remember when Abby Wambach "saved the USA's life!" in the most recent Women's World Cup against Brazil? I've seen plenty of other times when international refs didn't play nice with the USA in soccer, but that was probably the worst. And if not for the miracle, I might still be complaining about it.

So again, if the US got a break, I guess I'm not inclined to feel too bad about it. But as a proponent of just getting calls right and having felt how awful it is to have a game ruined by the refs, I do feel for Canada. Now, that said, I don't think this was a one-sided screw job. It was more of an embarrassing example of officiating where the bigger breaks went the in USA's favor.

[maz]

The officiating was crap. It's that simple. Both sides were victims, Canada more than USA. The Canadians were not as innocent as they'd like to think they are, and the calls resulting in the US PK goal were at least understandable (while giving nothing for stomping on a down player is not).

In the end, Canada had the same 30 extra minutes to score that the US did, and they did not. They had a chance to keep the US from tying it the first time, and they did not. They should blame themselves just as much as the refs.