7 FRARSA Rezende
What an occasion to be a part of - the tifos at Stade Vélodrome were brilliant and the atmosphere absolutely electric as France kicked off their own World Cup campaign against South Africa. Especially in COVID-times, we are reminded how special moments and matches like these are.
Despite only leading by a single goal with twenty minutes remaining, France ran out comfortable three-nothing winners - South Africa were worthy opponents and performed well on their World Cup finals debut, but in truth, never really looked like scoring.
The referees who had the honour of controlling this match were led by the centre from Brazil, Márcio Rezende de Freitas. This was quite a weird game, both the difficulty of it and the effectiveness of it's referee are hard to determine, but Rezende did far from a bad job on the night, if not an optimal one.
Big Decisions
Theoretically, the most important decision taken by the match officials was the goal disallowed by Trinidadian assistant Merere Gonzales at 53' - a clearly correct call. But what the Brazilian referee did to get us there, in that moment, was awful and very nearly catastrophic for this performance.
First, he plays a rather weak advantage for what would have been a soft attacking freekick to France (consistent with his line for the game) which then breaks down. Didier Deschamps then commits a foul sliding tackle, which was on the careless-reckless borderline.
Rezende puts his whistle to his mouth, but then relents - he is giving South Africa a very dubious advantage with no signal. The referee then turns his back, and an interception gives France an obvious goal-scoring opportunity. Some advantage for South Africa!
Given the close proximity of the foul to the interception (a few seconds), the fairest thing to do would be to come back for the freekick, but the Brazilian ref panics and allows play to continue(!) - he is so fortunate that Christophe Dugarry is offside, and the goal can be disallowed.
First, he plays a rather weak advantage for what would have been a soft attacking freekick to France (consistent with his line for the game) which then breaks down. Didier Deschamps then commits a foul sliding tackle, which was on the careless-reckless borderline.
Rezende puts his whistle to his mouth, but then relents - he is giving South Africa a very dubious advantage with no signal. The referee then turns his back, and an interception gives France an obvious goal-scoring opportunity. Some advantage for South Africa!
Given the close proximity of the foul to the interception (a few seconds), the fairest thing to do would be to come back for the freekick, but the Brazilian ref panics and allows play to continue(!) - he is so fortunate that Christophe Dugarry is offside, and the goal can be disallowed.
The caution to Deschamps was supportable, if a bit soft to be honest. But the much larger point is that Rezende nearly through the game away with an extremely reckless piece of refereeing, if Dugarry was onside, that would have been an absolute disaster for him!
Besides - Rezende was not influenced by the howls for a penalty at 51' from his sub-optimal position, the ball never hit the defender's arm at all.
Besides - Rezende was not influenced by the howls for a penalty at 51' from his sub-optimal position, the ball never hit the defender's arm at all.
Managing the Game
Rezende was a serious man, and a serious referee, who aroused respect from the players. And to repeat what I said in the opening, this was not a bad performance. But I'm really not sure it was a good one.
His foul detection was good, but his threshold for what contacts should be assessed as unfair was much, much lower than what the players expected, or even really wanted. To give just one example of this, the call at 16' for a promising attacking freekick.
His foul detection was good, but his threshold for what contacts should be assessed as unfair was much, much lower than what the players expected, or even really wanted. To give just one example of this, the call at 16' for a promising attacking freekick.
For a few minutes in the second half, France players clocked this and started taking the piss essentially, by going down after no/ultra-minimal contact, but Rezende saw through almost all of them, and the game returned to normal.
His use of sanctions was okay, but not really that consistent - 31' was a rather clear SPA ignored (so was the foul in the first thirty seconds by the way!), and further fouls at 50' and 73' had some arguments for cautioning. I struggle to see the difference between 75' and the three cautions for reckless given, but okay.
He correctly saw through a couple of dives by names very familiar to us, Zidane at 10', Henry at 86', but I must say this - buy a proper whistle! I genuinely have no idea what he uses (Simon the same), but the scene at 24' was really comical and would have been totally avoided if he had a whistle the whole stadium / players could clearly hear.
In summary, the key dynamic in this game was the nervousness of the players - France were opening their home World Cup in Marseille (and their first WC finals game in a generation too), and South Africa their first finals game ever. Their nerves visible, they needed a referee to guide them through this occasion.
Did Márcio Rezende do that? Well, the unhelpful answer is yes and no, but on reflection I would err more towards the former. As irritating as his tight match practice might have been for the players, it was quite predictable when Rezende was going to blow, and his serious manner gave them security in him as a leader. However, his use of cards in addition to his distant, angry manner, was not optimal.
In the end, I would see this performance more positively than negatively - there is no way of knowing what could have happened with the polar opposite (friendly, lenient) referee in charge, and all-things-said-and-done, 53' aside, this game turned out well for the officials.
His use of sanctions was okay, but not really that consistent - 31' was a rather clear SPA ignored (so was the foul in the first thirty seconds by the way!), and further fouls at 50' and 73' had some arguments for cautioning. I struggle to see the difference between 75' and the three cautions for reckless given, but okay.
He correctly saw through a couple of dives by names very familiar to us, Zidane at 10', Henry at 86', but I must say this - buy a proper whistle! I genuinely have no idea what he uses (Simon the same), but the scene at 24' was really comical and would have been totally avoided if he had a whistle the whole stadium / players could clearly hear.
In summary, the key dynamic in this game was the nervousness of the players - France were opening their home World Cup in Marseille (and their first WC finals game in a generation too), and South Africa their first finals game ever. Their nerves visible, they needed a referee to guide them through this occasion.
Did Márcio Rezende do that? Well, the unhelpful answer is yes and no, but on reflection I would err more towards the former. As irritating as his tight match practice might have been for the players, it was quite predictable when Rezende was going to blow, and his serious manner gave them security in him as a leader. However, his use of cards in addition to his distant, angry manner, was not optimal.
In the end, I would see this performance more positively than negatively - there is no way of knowing what could have happened with the polar opposite (friendly, lenient) referee in charge, and all-things-said-and-done, 53' aside, this game turned out well for the officials.
Assistant Referees
There are worse people you could have as friends in FIFA refereeing than your compatriot Mr Jack Warner! This appointment procedure (Brazil-Brazil-T&T-Chile) actually makes no sense unless you are looking through the Warnerian lens; this an two-hours that Merere Gonzales could quite rightly cherish forever - and he performed decently too.
Gonzales was the recipient of a particularly vigorous pre-match Rezende pep talk, one had the impression he (understandably) looked a bit nervous. That bore out with a poor flag in the fourth minute. However, he played a good onside at 20', and actually showed decent concentration to make the expected aforementioned call at 53'. So, not bad at all for the Trinidadian in the final reckoning.
Arnaldo Pinto was significantly busier - he began with a good crossover onside at 3'. After that, we are rather befallen by the lack of widescreen and / or replay angles, but overall my feeling said that this was a good (more 8,3 than 8,4 in UEFA) performance by Rezende's compatriot on the near side.
Gonzales was the recipient of a particularly vigorous pre-match Rezende pep talk, one had the impression he (understandably) looked a bit nervous. That bore out with a poor flag in the fourth minute. However, he played a good onside at 20', and actually showed decent concentration to make the expected aforementioned call at 53'. So, not bad at all for the Trinidadian in the final reckoning.
Arnaldo Pinto was significantly busier - he began with a good crossover onside at 3'. After that, we are rather befallen by the lack of widescreen and / or replay angles, but overall my feeling said that this was a good (more 8,3 than 8,4 in UEFA) performance by Rezende's compatriot on the near side.
(by the way, for what did Mario Sánchez Yantén need the extension lead he was carrying before the match? :D)
Balance
In a surreal match, which must have been a great pleasure to take part in (Rezende talks about the pride of it when resumé-ing his career in interviews), despite there being some doubts on the part of each of the three officials (53' especially for the ref), all had a solid enough evening on the whole.| Márcio Rezende de Freitas - 6 Arnaldo Pinto - 7 Merere Gonzales - 7 Mario Sánchez Yantén BRA, BRA, TRI | France 3-0 South Africa Group Stage 12 June |
 Petit (27') - Tackle Deschamps (53') - Tackle Zidane (75') - Delaying the Restart | Jackson (37') - Challenge |
Rezende did not seem to be at the same level as his preceding Brazilian WC refs Coelho, Filho or Wright.
ReplyDelete