MLS Eastern Conference Final – MTL 2nd goal was OFFSIDE!

 

The last few weeks have seen a multitude of MLS history in the making. The meeting of Montreal Impact and Toronto FC in the Easter Conference Final meant that for the first time ever, there would be a Canadian team in the MLS Cup Final!  The first leg of this historic event saw Montreal beat Toronto FC 3-2 at home, which meant that Toronto needed a win in the second leg, at home.  The Reds knew that it wasn’t going to be easy.  If Montral scored just one away goal, it would mean that TFC needed to work a little harder to get 2, and the more goals the Impact scored, the harder TFC needed to work in order to win the conference.

The second leg was a bit of a roller coaster and things were looking a little grim as Montreal opened the score line in the 24th minute.  Toronto needed 2 goals to win this series and they began to press…hard!  The light for TFC grew brighter as Armando Cooper leveled it off in the 37th minute, and Altidore bagged his first for the night in the 45th (making him the only MLS player to score a goal in every playoff match thus far).  If the score line remained this way, TFC would have won and gone through to the MLS Cup Final however, just 8 minutes into the second half, Ignacio Piatti leveled the score at 2 in the 53rd minute.  But wait…this goal should not have counted and makes this a major turning point in the match, and in my opinion makes for a Critical Match Incident and should be PRO’s next Play of the Week. 

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Rio 2016 – Massive Offside FAIL by Tonga AR

LAW 11 – OFFSIDE, probably the most difficult and controversial law of all 17 IFAB Laws of the Game.  It’s generally accepted that most people don’t know the law fully including all of its interpretations, nor would most expect everyone to know the offside law inside-out.  However, the few people on this planet one would expect to know this law, and not make such a massive error are the top, elite FIFA list Assistant Referees.  Unfortunately, the Rio 2016 quarter final between the United States and Sweden saw what I consider the biggest fail by a FIFA AR at a major tournament.  

Thank you IFAB for yet another monkey wrench!

Recently, IFAB has sent out a new circular heavily pertaining to Law 11 and the interpretation of the offside law.  In particular, it pays close attention to “Interfering with and opponent” and the act of a “”Save”.  Along with the circular, The FA have also distributed a clarification memo, and illustrative examples to help referees at all levels understand what is actually being discussed.  I’m not going to go into them in great detail – if you would like to see the material for yourself, you are more than welcome to download them below:

DOGSO-H or Offside??? I can’t decide!

In a Bundesliga match between Hertha BSC and FC Nurnberg on February 2, 2014, a rather interesting match situation occurs and I can’t figure out what the correct decision should be.  I’ve been fighting with myself for over 3 weeks and at first I thought I knew the answer however, upon looking at the clip again, I’m starting to second guess myself.  So I ask you all…did the referee get it right in the end?

REPRISE: Players, Coaches and Spectators…Law 11

Back in October I wrote a post about the new interpretation to Law 11.  The original link to the explanation has since then been broken and I think I’ve figured out why…the interpretation (IMHO) was incorrect

Concentration: Plight of the AR

The Assistant Referee Is an important and integral part of the beautiful game. Their job is to assist the referee in managing the game wherever and whenever possible. However, there is one job that I would say is 99.9% that of the AR – Law 11: Offside!