The chaaaaampiiiooooonnnnsss
On Tuesday, the Columbus Crew lost 0-1 to Mexican club Santos in the CONCACAF Champions League quarterfinals. Apparently, this victory was not without some referee controversy; Columbus had a goal disallowed in the 22nd minute with the score at 0-0.
Lucky for us, the referee has now explained the reasoning behind his decision on the disallowed goal.
Crew forward Emilio Renteria received a pass from a restart and then crossed the ball into the box to Andy Iro who headed home the goal. Except it wasn’t, but only after complaints and a referee confab.
According to the official referee report, Emilio Renteria had never legally re-entered the field of play after receiving treatment on the sideline. According to Law 3 (PDF WARNING), the play must be stopped, a yellow card issued and an indirect kick awarded for the opposing team.
That’s all well and good, except when you start to look at the video (See below starting at 1:00). It appears that Renteria entered the field of play prior to the free kick being taken, looked around to make sure he was ok to come on and then received some assurances. From whom, the video is not clear.
It looks like the referee looked directly at Renteria as he was coming on and did not wave him off. Plus, it looks like Renteria was checking back with the fourth official to be double sure and received the approval necessary. Finally, it was a dead ball situation and I cannot see why a referee would not allow the player back on in that situation if the injury had been treated, which it had.
In the end, it appears that referee, if he never waved the player on, followed the letter of the law but justice was not certainly done.
I’ve been watching a few of these games lately on the various Spanish TV channels. For the most part, pretty boring stuff. Last night’s Cruz Azul v RSL tilt was ok until the monsoon hit. I’m glad the real CL is starting soon.
@ben: you must have missed the last 5 minutes, then. As for the Crew game, I’ve already said what bulls**t it was but I wonder if the Crew have any recourse. At the very least, that ref shouldn’t do another CCL game but I’m not holding my breath.
Should have seen red for the elbow also. Crew got hosed.
looks like MLS has continually gotten hosed to me. The first goal in the cruz RSL games was from a quick free kick taken with a clearly rolling ball, and one of the other cruz azul goals looked offsides. also wrong calls for gk vs corner, etc.
@Arkie: Yeah, I’d like to take this competition seriously but it’s hard with s**t like this. Now I kinda understand why there has been such s**tty attendance at these games (except for Seattle).
Doesn’t this give Mexican teams two ways into the Club World Cup? They are also eligible for the Copa Lib now, aren’t they?
Seems patently unfair. Also unfair: the officiating. Nowhere in the Americas do US teams (either club or int’l) get a fair shake ever from officials.
PR: while Mexican teams are eligible to play in the Copa Libertadores, they do so as invited guests since the cup is a CONMEBOL operation, whereas Mexico belongs to CONCACAF. this means that if a Mexican club makes it to the final (like Chivas did this past edition), the second finalist will automatically qualify for the Club World Cup by virtue of being the last CONMEBOL team in the competition (not that it mattered this time, since Chivas were beaten anyway… f**k). to sum it all up, a team can participate in the Club World Cup only by winning the international cup of their respective region. so, no Mexican team will ever make it to the CWC by winning the Libertadores. easy now.
That makes total sense. And duh (to me). Can’t believe that didn’t occur to me as I actual have a medal for a national championship won here in the US after finishing second to a team from Canada (not in soccer), who weren’t eligible to win our national championship.
that just reminds me how much i despise Canadian sports teams for playing in US leagues.