Monday, July 12, 2010

FIFA must address soccer shortfalls

I shall take two powerful and lingering memories from the recent World Cup of soccer, and neither of them are positive.
In the first instance, an Italian striker is streaking towards the opposition goal as a fellow forward is prising a gap on the sideline. Suddenly, just as the man going for open space near the goal is actually in open space, he falls down like he’s been shot, clutching his leg. Calf-muscle pull? Assassination attempt? Nope. The guy appeals to the referee, calling for a penalty kick right at the top of the 18-metre line.
Small problem: there wasn’t a defender within two yards when the striker went into his swan dive.
In the second instance, the Dutch earned a free kick in the dying minutes of the second extra frame of the final. On the ensuing kick, the ball deflected off a Spanish defender and out of bounds for a corner kick ... save that the official, who was seriously tested all game long, incorrectly awarded a goal kick. Two minutes later, the Spanish win the game on the match’s only goal.
The above two instances underscore everything that is wrong with elite-level soccer.
Fortunately, both can be readily fixed.
At the highest level of the game, players insist on embellishing even the littlest bump. This has to be addressed. Other sports have a methodology for dealing with instances of player embellishment of non-fouls. Hockey implemented the “diving” penalty, and I, as a lacrosse official, have administered an unsportsmanlike conduct penalty for a similar act. Soccer needs to do something – but I don’t know what: a yellow card seems a bit harsh. Then again, if officials issued a few yellow cards for faking a penalty, maybe people wouldn’t be calling the recent soccer event the World Diving Championships.
Maybe FIFA could borrow a tactic from rugby, and send a player off for five minutes for a diving infraction. I know that will offend soccer purists, but as a sporting purist, the blatant faking of injuries and fouls plaguing soccer is one of the reasons it will never gain better traction in North America where hockey, lacrosse, football and other more forceful contact and collision sports are played.
On another front, let’s be honest: the World Cup featured missed calls, blown calls, non-calls and other examples of poor or questionable officiating. In one game, a goal was discounted that was clearly in. On the road to the World Cup, the French eliminated the Irish on a clear but not-called hand ball.
In the World Cup final itself, Netherlands striker Arjen Robben was involved in a sprint to the net late in the second half. A Spanish defender, Carles Puyol, charged in, and grabbed Robben by his waist as he began a clear-cut breakaway to the goal.
The official - Howard Webb - could only see the backs of the involved players. According to reports, he signalled an “advantage” foul, in which the error is acknowledged, but the play allowed to proceed. However, from my point of view, the foul seriously impacted Robben’s chance to score. In the NHL, a similar play would have been a two-minute minor, if not a penalty shot.
As a veteran official as well as a sports writer, any time I see an officiating error, I immediately ponder mechanics – the positioning of an official. Nine times out of 10, when a call is blown, the arbiter is in the wrong spot. But when I looked at the replays of the Robben non-call, Webb was in a good spot for the flow of the play at the time. He was just in the wrong spot for that particular instance, which is why he didn’t see what everybody around the world saw on TV.
The World Cup featured the best officials in the business, and FIFA (along with its constituent bodies) has some excellent referee-development plans. The competence and quality of officials is not, contrary to the howls one constantly reads on British soccer fan chat boards, a problem. Nonetheless, it’s plain to see that soccer officials are, simply put, overwhelmed.
That observation leads into an obvious conclusion: soccer at its highest levels needs to implement a two-official or even a three-official system. It works in lacrosse, it works in hockey, it works in many other sports.
Were there two officials on-field Sunday, maybe, just maybe, one of them would have been in a better place to the clear and obvious deflection on that late-game free kick, and the Dutch allowed to take a critical corner-kick they were otherwise deprived of.
Yes, the better team won the World Cup. But had that officiating error not taken place, what might have happened? It’s that what-if that FIFA needs to take seriously and address if it is ever to improve the state of the world’s most popular sport.

Vern Faulkner is the Courier/Courier Weekend editor. He has officiated football for 14 years and lacrosse for three.

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