England’s Top Dog, Howard Webb will referee the first leg of the Real Madrid v. Bayern Munich semifinal on Wednesday, April 23. Regular readers know that I think Webb, despite his experience and the fact that he already has his ticket to Brazil, isn’t England’s best referee anymore. That honour now goes to Mark Clattenburg, while Webb has visibly struggled
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The Atletico Madrid v. Chelsea Champions League semifinal will be officiated by The Big Swede: Jonas Eriksson. Eriksson has been very active in European action this season. In addition to some Europa league matches (including Tottenham’s), he refereed Manchester City v. Barcelona in the Group of 16 and Bayern Munich v. Manchester United in the quarterfinals. He’s performed pretty well in
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It’s the attack of the middle-aged bald(ing) referees for Champions League on Wednesday, April 9. Jonas Eriksson of Sweden will referee Bayern Munich v. Manchester United, and Howard Webb of England will officiate Atletico Madrid v. Barcelona. The last time Jonas Eriksson officiated a Manchester team in the Champions League, he had a really hard time of it (see above).
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The referees for the first two quarterfinal second legs are Pedro Proenca of Portgual and Damir Skomina of Slovenia. Proenca will be at Stamford Bridge for Chelsea v. PSG, and Skomina will officiate Real Madrid v. Dortmund. Proenca is about as safe a bet as you can get. Not only is he a World Cup referee, but he’s just so good
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Yes, it was a dive. Wayne Rooney took advantage of a poorly-thought out challenge from Bastian Schweinsteiger, who was already on a yellow. Rooney tripped over him and literally threw himself into the air, arms splayed, head thrown back, like the worst ballerina ever. The dive worked, though; Rooney conned referee Carlos Velasco Carballo into a second yellow card and a sending off
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For the record, Mark Clattenburg is on fire this year. Just when I said I suspected that there would be no non-World Cup referees in the Champions League quarterfinals, he comes up big for Real Madrid v. Dortmund. It’s a shame, really. Howard Webb’s struggles are well-known, and Clatts is having the year of his life. If the last 6-9 months were
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We’re in the quarterfinals of the Champions League, which means shit gets real for both the teams and the referees. From this point on, I’d be surprised to see an “outlier” amongst the Champions League referees. I think you’ll see the best of the best: The men who are not only at the top of their UEFA form, but are
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The Champions League referees for Wednesday, March 19 have been announced. UEFA have clearly moved away from using non-Elite referees in these matches, because these guys are about as Elite as they come. Arguably the world’s top ref, Bjorn Kuipers (above), will referee Manchester United’s tie against Olympiakos. Moyes and company shouldn’t have much to complain about there; Kuipers is
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The referees for this week’s Champions League matches have been announced. Chelsea will get Felix Brych (above) for their tie against Galatasaray. They can’t complain about that; Brych is about as strong a referee as they come and has recently unseated Wolfgang Stark as Germany’s top official. He’s on the list for Brazil, as well. Well, let me clarify: They shouldn’t
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The Champions League referees for the second leg of the Round of 16 have been announced. The rather anti-climactic tie between Paris Saint-Germain and Bayer Leverkusen (PSG leads about a billion to nil on aggregate) will be refereed by Croatia’s top official, Ivan Bebek (above). Stephane Lannoy of France, whose year has included being the first French official in forever
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