Martin Atkinson

Jaxa

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AWB was actually the right side of the Soucek to make the challenge and slid in front of him as they both attempted to reach the ball and both failed. The contact was absolutely minimal and not enough to bring him down. Look for yourself:



Soucek basically just leaned into the challenge and folded his legs.
I was thinking this, AWB attempts to get the ball sliding in front of Soucek and misses it but Soucek actually comes in from behind AWB and falls into AWB also missing the ball,

It's extremely convenient for pundits these days to just completely ignore the most obvious of points that need to be referenced if it doesn't fit their agenda or there just plain thick , probably the latter tbh but it's infuriating
 

lloyd2wayne

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Nope - no offside as they showed on MOTD2.

Also Soucek wasn't offside so even if the linesman flagged it shouldn't have matter... AWB just cleaned him out.
AWB just cleaned him out? He got to the ball first before Soucek. How can you even think that is a penalty? Weird
 

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Is he really a Leeds fan? If he is, then why is he even allowed to officiate our games? In fact, having him in charge of any premier league games could be considered problematic.
Most officials are fans of certain clubs. That should impede their professionalism and qualities.
 

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I was thinking this, AWB attempts to get the ball sliding in front of Soucek and misses it but Soucek actually comes in from behind AWB and falls into AWB also missing the ball,

It's extremely convenient for pundits these days to just completely ignore the most obvious of points that need to be referenced if it doesn't fit their agenda or there just plain thick , probably the latter tbh but it's infuriating
That’s exactly what happened. AWB was quicker towards the ball and got in front of him, when Soucek realised he wasn’t getting the ball either he leaned into and fell over AWB.


What AWB did had no impact on Soucek reaching the ball, Football is a contact sport and you’ve every right to compete for a ball. not every bit of contact is a foul.
 

peridigm

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Clearly upset his team have not managed a win yet this season and sit one point off relegation.
 

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AWB just cleaned him out? He got to the ball first before Soucek. How can you even think that is a penalty? Weird
One man is vertical and one man is horizontal. Neither gets the ball but the vertical man is made horizontal by contact from the guy on the floor. Ref would give that a free kick anywhere else.

But I agree it's not clear cut. In fact all penalty decisions on the day were pretty much ok by the ref. Not enough players trying to stay on their feet and looking for an easy win by going down.
 

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One man is vertical and one man is horizontal. Neither gets the ball but the vertical man is made horizontal by contact from the guy on the floor. Ref would give that a free kick anywhere else.

But I agree it's not clear cut. In fact all penalty decisions on the day were pretty much ok by the ref. Not enough players trying to stay on their feet and looking for an easy win by going down.
:lol:

Nice try
 

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Just my opinion as a Liverpool fan who has seen far, far more horrendous decisions in our games in the past (still can't get Welbeck's out of my head for a start, and that's just the start).

We can agree to disagree on yesterday's game. :)
 

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Atkinson had an absolute shocker as did his mates at VAR. We will watch games where handball from two yards won’t be given and Shearer and co will say ‘ You can give that from that distance’. I remember Suarez the biter chipping the ball onto Raphael’s arm from a yard away when he played for the Scousers and it was given as a pen. VAR supposed to sort this out.
 

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Just my opinion as a Liverpool fan who has seen far, far more horrendous decisions in our games in the past (still can't get Welbeck's out of my head for a start, and that's just the start).

We can agree to disagree on yesterday's game. :)
Which is clouded, obviously.

Don't think I've heard from one ex player/pundit that all the decisions were "ok". Whether it's in West Hams favor or United's favor, there's AT LEAST one poor decision in those penalty claims from the referee.
 

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One man is vertical and one man is horizontal. Neither gets the ball but the vertical man is made horizontal by contact from the guy on the floor. Ref would give that a free kick anywhere else.

But I agree it's not clear cut. In fact all penalty decisions on the day were pretty much ok by the ref. Not enough players trying to stay on their feet and looking for an easy win by going down.
Agree that its the attackers responsibility to jump out/leap over lunging knees (coufal) and sliding tackles (zouma). If they bump and fall, that's on them. /s

Changing the rules of the game for Ronaldo and United. Liverpool and Leeds fans (Twatkinson)

I guess I am falling for your windup post.
 

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Which is clouded, obviously.

Don't think I've heard from one ex player/pundit that all the decisions were "ok". Whether it's in West Hams favor or United's favor, there's AT LEAST one poor decision in those penalty claims from the referee.
haha, and there was this female pundit, who won the WSL with Liverpool on one of the videos, guess what, she thinks AWB and Shaw incidents were both penalties and neither of Ronaldo's were. Leon Osman was the other pundit who couldn't believe any of the calls.
 

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The problem with VAR is that they've implemented it without a clear strategy for its use and a clear outline of why it's being used. It's just there, and they seem to make up what they're doing with it week by week.

We keep hearing "clear and obvious" but last season that meant analysing everything to the nth degree, to the point that offsides were being called because of armpit hairs being off, and it seemed almost any decision referred to VAR was being overturned.

This season the "clear and obvious" line is still about, except we're also hearing about "flow" and it now seems that almost every decision the on field ref makes stands regardless of how bad it is.
Agree that there’s no clear guideline on when it’s to be used. The what is clearly defined but without guidelines, you get this, where things are seemingly made up on the fly and changing season by season as you mentioned. But even this, I would classify as part of a larger issue of insufficient accountability on bad refereeing performances.
 

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Agree that its the attackers responsibility to jump out/leap over lunging knees (coufal) and sliding tackles (zouma). If they bump and fall, that's on them. /s

Changing the rules of the game for Ronaldo and United. Liverpool and Leeds fans (Twatkinson)

I guess I am falling for your windup post.
It's the old Salah discussion isn't it? Ronaldo in each of those occasions was 'looking for it like a dirty foreigner (just without being brown or bearded in this case)'. So if he's looking for it we're not giving it is the old English attitude.
 

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Just my opinion as a Liverpool fan who has seen far, far more horrendous decisions in our games in the past (still can't get Welbeck's out of my head for a start, and that's just the start).

We can agree to disagree on yesterday's game. :)
There was the Luke shaw handsball which did not even need VAR as it was so obviously a penalty.
But then there were 2 penalties on Ronaldo which warranted checking and viewing VAR - Why were they not viewed?!

Is there a chance that Ronaldo will get a penalty this season?
Or are they the comments of one Klopper who is subtly manipulating referees to his own advantage?

It think that we can agree to agree on yesterday's game and the two penaltis not given to United.
Be honest and not play dumb.
 

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Isn't he though?

The side on view shows he's tight with our man furthest back, would have been one for VAR

According to Dale it might not have mattered, though surely that's only if Bowen is offside?


AWB just cleaned him out? He got to the ball first before Soucek. How can you even think that is a penalty? Weird
Think the weird take here is thinking that AWB got to the ball!
 

Flying high

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The side on view shows he's tight with our man furthest back, would have been one for VAR

According to Dale it might not have mattered, though surely that's only if Bowen is offside?




Think the weird take here is thinking that AWB got to the ball!
He didn't get the ball because the west ham player fouled him. AWB was in front, in relation to the ball, which is what makes all the difference here. Had he been the other side of the attacker then it should have been a penalty.
 

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He didn't get the ball because the west ham player fouled him. AWB was in front, in relation to the ball, which is what makes all the difference here. Had he been the other side of the attacker then it should have been a penalty.
Bingo. He’s in front of Soucek and slides towards the ball. It’s that simple.
 

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Bingo. He’s in front of Soucek and slides towards the ball. It’s that simple.
Now, I’ve posted this before but I distinctly remember Dermot saying that VAR can’t get involved because it’s given as a foul and VAR can’t overrule non pen fouls. They would have to overrule the foul given first to get to the pen but they aren’t allowed to do that.
Someone tell me I’m not going crazy?
 

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The side on view shows he's tight with our man furthest back, would have been one for VAR

According to Dale it might not have mattered, though surely that's only if Bowen is offside?




Think the weird take here is thinking that AWB got to the ball!
Definitely think it's a foul by AWB on Soucek rather than the other way around but I assume that would then have prompted an offside check, so it might not have been given anyway.

Edit: tweet not showing for some reason, just Dale Johnson saying "It's possible the Soucek was just offside, but this wasn't checked and not the reason the penalty wasn't awarded. It would have been close but impossible to tell from the camera angle. He might well have just been onside by the new VAR interpretation"
 

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Now, I’ve posted this before but I distinctly remember Dermot saying that VAR can’t get involved because it’s given as a foul and VAR can’t overrule non pen fouls. They would have to overrule the foul given first to get to the pen but they aren’t allowed to do that.
Someone tell me I’m not going crazy?
That actually makes sense.
 

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It's literally done in rugby and pretty much everyone that watches both sports prefers being able to hear the ref explaining their decisions. It's such an easy improvement to implement and makes the viewing experience so much better for the people actually paying for the product.

I can only imagine the reason it isn't already in place is that the refs are terrified of exposing how clueless and/or bent they really are. The weird refusal to use VAR for fouls like the ones on Ronaldo yesterday also points towards this. Fragile egos that can't handle being proven wrong even once.
Accountability is the only way the poor level of EPL officiating begins to improve. If an official can't justify his calls to the public or can't handle being questioned by the public, then he's in the wrong profession. There is a fine line between scrutiny and abuse, and the latter shouldn't be tolerated, yet the decisions that were made can ruin entire careers and ref's should be held to account for their decisions. Even so, there will always be disagreements about application of the laws but I really feel the officiating standard would improve tremendously by removing a lot of the bias through accountability.
 

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Accountability is the only way the poor level of EPL officiating begins to improve
I think part of the problem is that there is no intention of improving much. For example, apparently the referee review panel found two mistakes with Atkinson's decisions yesterday. Now what is going to happen

- Is he going to be asked to up his game or be replaced by others?
- Is he going to get docked some points based on which he will be assigned less games?
- Is he going to get his pay affected if he starts officiating lesser games?
 

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I think it was a foul by Soucek, he just ran into the back of wan bisakka. He was nowhere near the ball and in an offside position so shouldn't be interfering with play anyway. The penalty decisions are one thing but he was crap for 90 mins, most of his decisions were wrong and wildly inconsistent from one second to the next.
 

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He's worse than a dreadful ref. He geniunely seems to officiate against us. At least some of the other PL referees are just incompetant.
 

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That’s exactly what happened. AWB was quicker towards the ball and got in front of him, when Soucek realised he wasn’t getting the ball either he leaned into and fell over AWB.


What AWB did had no impact on Soucek reaching the ball, Football is a contact sport and you’ve every right to compete for a ball. not every bit of contact is a foul.
:houllier:

AWB was as stone-wall as the one by Coufal and Zouma. Atkinson and VAR had a mare, there should've been 4 penalties in that game.
 

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:houllier:

AWB was as stone-wall as the one by Coufal and Zouma. Atkinson and VAR had a mare, there should've been 4 penalties in that game.
Agreed.

Should have been 4 penalties in the game and Atkinson said no to them all, and VAR only intervened to correct him once.

A shocking performance by the officials.
 

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There is a fine line between scrutiny and abuse, and the latter shouldn't be tolerated, yet the decisions that were made can ruin entire careers and ref's should be held to account for their decisions.
I think there will be less abuse than there is now if there's some accountability. Like if the referee explains why they thought x is/isn't a penalty etc., then at least you have things from their POV, rather than now, where you're just left assuming they're blind/bent/stupid.
 

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Pretty sure refs have the option of fronting up and opting to not referee games involving their clubs' biggest rivals. Atkinson has never refereed a Leeds or a Bradford match and yet he and the powers that be think that he can be impartial when it comes to Manchester United, despite the ever mounting evidence to the contrary.

Rank idiocy allowing him anywhere near our games, and even worse to let him referee with some spineless junior responsible for the VAR calls, someone too wimpy to overrule him.

Mike Dean is a shockingly bad referee but at least he's bad in all directions, with his quest to be the centre of attention in every game. Atkinson is equally inept but doesn't even try to hide his biases. And yet the two are the most experienced referees we have now. State of refereeing in the league is at an all-time low when the Prem is at an all-time high in terms of player and managerial talent.
 

Robaldo

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Saw someone else post it in the matchday thread but his and VAR's officiating in stoppage time on Sunday was so utterly inexplicable that I couldn't enjoy it, even after; which is possibly the first time I've felt that?