In addition to all the usual appointment news and fun stuff, we had a couple of big stories this week on Play the Advantage. The Wall Street Journal published an article about FIFA’s referee selection process and how it basically screwed at least one referee over, but I had a slightly different perspective… In what may be a regular feature,
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Update, March 1: The referee for the Capital One Cup final on Sunday, March 2 between Manchester City and Sunderland is Martin Atkinson. It’s a Cup week, with the Capital One Cup semifinals on Tuesday and Wednesday, and the FA Cup fourth round on Friday, Saturday, and Sunday. Cups are always exciting, because we get to see some new faces along with the
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How cute is this picture of Howard Webb photobombing his uber-serious (and uber-cold, looks like) refereeing team? You just keep being you, Howard. You just keep being you.
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Now that we know who’s going to the World Cup, here are my initial thoughts on the choices. I’m focusing right now on the Europeans, since I know them best. Felix Brych, Germany Brych has been on the ascendancy in Germany for quite some time. Wolfgang Stark has been the number one in Germany until now, but over the past
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I’ll analyze this list more in the coming days, but a couple of notes: Mark Geiger from the US is in. Go, Mark. Mark Clattenburg from England, despite having had a good year, was passed over for Howard Webb, who refereed the final in 2010. Clatts is only 38, so he’ll have another shot. Europe’s referees are mostly the old
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It’s starting to get a little boring. Apparently, whenever a team starts to go completely lousy, the manager comes out and says something stupid about the referees to try and obfuscate the issue: that his team suck. First, there was good old Brendan “Geographically Correct” Rodgers. Then there was the Great Adam Lallana Affair over at Southampton. Both were smear campaigns
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It’s Monday and Monday is Funday! Or the day the Premier League referee appointments are announced. Same thing. There are no big games this week, so nothing really surprising or unusual. Howard Webb will be at Southampton; let’s hope he doesn’t hurt Princess Adam Lallana’s little feelings by commenting on the weather or anything. In other news, it’s always nice to
Read moreOriginally posted on In For The Hat Trick:
It’s been a bad week for Howard Webb. Fans are still parsing his controversial performance in Chelsea’s 2-1 win over Liverpool, and on New Year’s Day, David Moyes called his failure to award Ashley Young a penalty “scandalous…an incredible decision, probably one of the worst I think I saw.” It’s also been…
If you love the game of football (“soccer” to you Americans), you either love them or hate them (probably hate them): Referees. For a bunch of guys who spend all their time ruining the game – according to whatever fans are on the losing side – they’re probably the most important person on the pitch. And as we gear up
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PLAY THE ADVANTAGE 