Good call on the red card ref.

[Lazie]

What was he thinking?

[Peter R]

harsh imo...but refs have some guidelines when studs show per peter pendergast... he agree for example with a yellow and not red for torres on his first yellow last wk.. proximity to player, bent knee, not much force... colocini looked bad from one angle and not so bad from another...but the linesman call it... yellow for me not red. why fa dknt assist them with the same replays we see is beyond me.

[Assasin]

I am with you on this. A bit harsh if you ask me.

[Paul Marin]

harsh imo...but refs have some guidelines when studs show per peter pendergast... he agree for example with a yellow and not red for torres on his first yellow last wk.. proximity to player, bent knee, not much force... colocini looked bad from one angle and not so bad from another...but the linesman call it... yellow for me not red. why fa dknt assist them with the same replays we see is beyond me.

I think harsh as well...but we have the benefit of replay as you say, and not the refs. Peter, transparency and technology will be a long time coming in football. It is hard to believe that anyone interested in fairness wouldn't want the system to be more transparent. So why don't they want fairness? Clearly it must be not in their best interests. With relegation and betting being part of the European game (where all the influence resides) one can only speculate.

[Assasin]

you ever implement technology yet? People don't like change. Just involve in some technology change and the first day of go live the internet went dead. They weren't happy. LOL.

It might not be sinister as you think.

[Peter R]

i watched two am. football matches recently... ny v dallas. dallas scored on a hail mary with 6 secs. to go ahead 30-29... but they reviewed the td and called it back...there is no way the refs cud have called it back without replay...in the end fairness prevailed.. similar situation in a college gme on a td run...called back after initially being given....AND ALL just using replay... have to gree with u ...more in the mortar than the pestle.

[Paul Marin]

you ever implement technology yet? People don't like change. Just involve in some technology change and the first day of go live the internet went dead. They weren't happy. LOL.

It might not be sinister as you think.

All I have done all my life is technology. I have had my own tech business and dealt with change management and the corresponding nightmares inherent in implementation - but progress is progress. However, as I've said here before, technology (in the football context) is best applied for "black and white" decisions and to support judgment calls by humans. I don't agree with how technology is used in most sports and would advocate a system that is different for football.

[Assasin]

Well I agree it will make a difference and it need to be in sports. As you say you technology all your life, then you understand that is not just conspiracy but old dinasours don't really want changes is a big reason why it hasn't happen.

The American sports are more likely to use technology than the international sports. Hopefully some people worldwide is waking up as technology grows.

[Gamma]

american football is a start stop start stop thing so it would not interefere so much as it would with proper football. the best football games are the ones that flow smoothly where you hardly notice the ref.

can you envision a game that is all technology with only the man in the middle who would basically be calling it as the supercomputer sees it?

[Paul Marin]

american football is a start stop start stop thing so it would not interefere so much as it would with proper football. the best football games are the ones that flow smoothly where you hardly notice the ref.

can you envision a game that is all technology with only the man in the middle who would basically be calling it as the supercomputer sees it?

In a regular professional soccer game, Bobby McMahon claims that only 60-70 minutes of the 90 are actually played. The ball going out of bounds chews up a lot of time; similarly, set plays and other forms of restarts. Clearly American Football and soccer are very different, but to think that soccer has no stoppages is inaccurate, it is just that they are unpredictable and varied. And as for a "super computer", as long as Karl is not the refereeing model they use to program it, I'm okay with that.

[Gamma]

i did not say that it did not have stoppages, i am simply saying that it is a more free flowing game, in american football there are 4 quarters of 15 minutes each ( i.e. 60 minutes not including half-time) which last 3 hours at least! in that time you coulda play 2 football matches even though they duration of each game is 90 minutes, that is a HUGE disparity ....

[Paul Marin]

i did not say that it did not have stoppages, i am simply saying that it is a more free flowing game, in american football there are 4 quarters of 15 minutes each ( i.e. 60 minutes not including half-time) which last 3 hours at least! in that time you coulda play 2 football matches even though they duration of each game is 90 minutes, that is a HUGE disparity ....

Why did I know you would focus on that irrelevant tidbit? The point is that the game (soccer) is not without it's own stoppages which is often *a* reason anti-technology advocates use to bar technology from the game. In reality, for most calls that matter (goals, penalties, some free kicks etc.), introducing replay technology (specifically) would not add any more stoppage time to the game. There are other forms of technology that should also be considered that would have no impact on the duration of the game or its free-flowing nature.

[Peter R]

In the incidents that I saw in Am Football and of course they may or may not be typical, the replays had to be scrutinised in the same way a very close run out is done in cricket as the calls were very close... in the NY Dallas game, the receiver's hand was out by probably the width of a baby finger. That review ate up more than the regular stoppage time to get back to the set position or whatever it is called. The point is that IMO getting it right should trump concerns about stoppages especially on critical plays and they seem to have adopted that view in Am Football.

My own experience with real football and we only have to look at recent incidents: Suarez goal disallowed, Chicharito's goal allowed, the second yellow on Torres for example, is that the very first replay in each of those incidents CLEARLY indicated what the reality was, in less time than it took to get the ball from the back of the net. IMO, the vast majority of bad football calls could be cleared up with just instant replay with virtually no time lost. And, just as is done in cricket on many reviews they first check to see if a ball was legal, the same should be done on goals,...to the extent that replays can rectify an on field error (ESPECIALLY when goals and red cards are dished out) the powers that be owe it to the game to use existing technology to clarify and to maintain the integrity of everyone... and the sport.

Peter Pendergast was on the Smax zone the other day and he was saying that referees WERE PART OF THE GAME... to underline his point, he asked what would be the call if a goal went in off the ref... the answer of course is that it is a goal. HOWEVER, I totally disagree with him. Some refs obviously share his view and feel obligated to insert themselves in a match when they have no business or real reason to. I DO NOT go to a football match or watch the game to see the ref. I couldn't care less about the ref... except I have to given that they are human and even the most superhuman among them (Karl?) will make HUMAN errors that can be easily fixed. Give me the supercomputer in the sky...! BUT as long as that won't happen FIFA et al should at least get off their backsides and move out of the 19th century into the 21st with at the minimum video review on goals.

[Paul Marin]

In the incidents that I saw in Am Football and of course they may or may not be typical, the replays had to be scrutinised in the same way a very close run out is done in cricket as the calls were very close... in the NY Dallas game, the receiver's hand was out by probably the width of a baby finger. That review ate up more than the regular stoppage time to get back to the set position or whatever it is called. The point is that IMO getting it right should trump concerns about stoppages especially on critical plays and they seem to have adopted that view in Am Football.

My own experience with real football and we only have to look at recent incidents: Suarez goal disallowed, Chicharito's goal allowed, the second yellow on Torres for example, is that the very first replay in each of those incidents CLEARLY indicated what the reality was, in less time than it took to get the ball from the back of the net. IMO, the vast majority of bad football calls could be cleared up with just instant replay with virtually no time lost. And, just as is done in cricket on many reviews they first check to see if a ball was legal, the same should be done on goals,...to the extent that replays can rectify an on field error (ESPECIALLY when goals and red cards are dished out) the powers that be owe it to the game to use existing technology to clarify and to maintain the integrity of everyone... and the sport.

Peter Pendergast was on the Smax zone the other day and he was saying that referees WERE PART OF THE GAME... to underline his point, he asked what would be the call if a goal went in off the ref... the answer of course is that it is a goal. HOWEVER, I totally disagree with him. Some refs obviously share his view and feel obligated to insert themselves in a match when they have no business or real reason to. I DO NOT go to a football match or watch the game to see the ref. I couldn't care less about the ref... except I have to given that they are human and even the most superhuman among them (Karl?) will make HUMAN errors that can be easily fixed. Give me the supercomputer in the sky...! BUT as long as that won't happen FIFA et al should at least get off their backsides and move out of the 19th century into the 21st with at the minimum video review on goals.

Peter, don't hold your breath. These people (FIFA et al) have no conscience. They are in the game for their own gain, not for love of the sport. Regardless of the technology used, I agree goals (and penalty awards) should be subject to higher levels of scrutiny.