43 GERIRN González
Epifanio González from Paraguay was the referee, who was entrusted with a trend-setting game on day two in which he was okay enough (CMRAUT). Actually the same can be said for this performance, González did enough in what was actually, relatively speaking, a pretty boring tie.
Big Decisions
More of a 'relevant match incident' than a key one, González's management at 31' really left a lot to be desired. Thomas Häßler was the recipient of a reckless standing leg tackle which must have been pretty painful.The referee played on, it should have at least been a freekick, and then what happened afterwards is pretty catastrophic in terms of game-management - which was indeed the nadir of this refereeing performance, but also a microcosm of it.
Managing the Game
Epifanio González again 'did enough' with his characteristic dictator style on the pitch, but to say that I didn't especially appreciate this performance would be a relatively polite way of formulating it.
His pedantic officiating throughout (2', 5', 19', 23', 25', 42', 45', 53', 72' eg.) inflamed the players, and the match as a whole, rather unnecessarily; the Paraguayan referee increase the tension of the field of play with his approach, not calming it down.
He set the bar too high in assessing reckless tackles, agricultural kicks at 13', 27', +46' should have drawn the yellow card, and the cards which were given were essentially pretty random. I liked the card at 47' for a deliberate kick, but the caution seconds later for Ali Daei's careless elbow was inexplicable.
In González's defence, booking was tactically valuable, but to operate with no clear line is really rather cheap in my opinion, the skill in refereeing is in setting a clear line, not knowing when to break it.
Honestly, I found his manner, displaying to everyone that he was the most important person in the stadium, very frustrating. Again, the other side of the coin is that at least he had some kind of charisma, and the players could indeed follow him. In a more challenging match, I suspect it might be rather different.
His pedantic officiating throughout (2', 5', 19', 23', 25', 42', 45', 53', 72' eg.) inflamed the players, and the match as a whole, rather unnecessarily; the Paraguayan referee increase the tension of the field of play with his approach, not calming it down.
He set the bar too high in assessing reckless tackles, agricultural kicks at 13', 27', +46' should have drawn the yellow card, and the cards which were given were essentially pretty random. I liked the card at 47' for a deliberate kick, but the caution seconds later for Ali Daei's careless elbow was inexplicable.
In González's defence, booking was tactically valuable, but to operate with no clear line is really rather cheap in my opinion, the skill in refereeing is in setting a clear line, not knowing when to break it.
Honestly, I found his manner, displaying to everyone that he was the most important person in the stadium, very frustrating. Again, the other side of the coin is that at least he had some kind of charisma, and the players could indeed follow him. In a more challenging match, I suspect it might be rather different.
Assistant Referees
It mattered for nothing in the bigger picture, but Celestino Galván would have failed the test if his decision to disallow a Germany third in additional time at the end of the second half was incorrect - instead, he got it spot on, Ulf Kirsten was off by half a yard. That included, good work by Galván (41', 46', +91') and Jorge Díaz Gálvez (10', 82').
Balance
Epifanio González passed the test in this slightly-odd game of normal difficulty, but according to the performance principle, his (actually!) smiley final whistle here should have been his last at World Cup 1998.
| Epifanio González - 6 Celestino Galván - 7 Jorge Díaz Gálvez - 7 Javier Castrilli PAR, PAR, CHI | Germany 2-0 Iran Group Stage 25 June |
 Klinsmann (31') - Dissent Häßler (47') - Challenge | Daei (47') - Striking |
Comments
Post a Comment