Quote:
Originally Posted by Rejean31
|
If FIFA does anything about this match it will be that will further punish the Canadian team unfortunatly rather then scold their own officials.
For the goodness of the Olympics they should just let the next medal matches to be played as is.
That was the most bizarre sequence of events I have seen by a referee especially at this level of competition and neve rmind as a Canadian but as long fan of soccer what Sinclair said is right when asked the question. She did not voluntarily go into some rant like FIFA is going to spin it.
Blasting the ball at a players face and that player has their arm protecting their face, chest or groin does not result in a free kick.
At any level of soccer if a keeper is handling the ball too long the ref will warn them 2 or 3 times prior to issuing a card. Even If a yellow card is issued, play just continues.
There is no doubt in my mind the USA coach instructed their players to delay getting out of the box and meanwhile start pointing out the ref that the keeper was still handling the ball.
Even though they still had a player usually lurking, sometimes behind or to MacLeods blind side. No experienced keeper will drop the ball for a clearing kick knowing there are players behind her somewhere within the box.
You can watch the replay of the game and the USA did this several times throughtout the game well before the 78th minute.
When the call was made personally I believe the trap had already been set and Wambach set it in motion with the influenced official.
The USA wanted to manufacture a free kick on the box line.
They manipulated the ref and it worked.
It was a disgrace on the part of the official and the USA team.
Not to mention the bizarre corner kicks awarded to the USA when they clearly did not maintain ball control and played it out of Canada's back line. 1 which directly lead to a USA goal.
Even bulldozing over the Canadian defender into the keeper would have resulted in the play being immediately blown dead and a Goal kick under any "normal" officiating.
The continous illegal marking of MacLeod on Corners by USA players.
The hand ball non call in the USA own box on Rapinoe I can see being missed, it does happen, it shouldn't have though being it was in the wide open and she clearly motioned her arm knocking it down striking her arm and chest. But the ball to hand call on Canada was absurd.
Funny how there is not ever strange calls or outcomes that go against the USA.
It won't be a surprise at all if controversy continues vs Japan if the match isn't going the Americans way.
My heart goes out to Sinclair and her squad for what should have been their victory.
Her play in particular was outstanding against worlds best ranked and a hat trick, nothing short of remarkable.
It doesn't matter on my opinion...
There is no doubt the ref directly influenced the outcome of this game as being pointed out by several soccer analysts globally.
Sportmanship is lost at the cost of winning and becomes Hypocrisy in its ugliest form.
