Champions League: A Night to Remember, Except for the Referee

Biased commenters obviously ...

Bad calls will happen, this game is very hard to officiate perfectly.

The referee probably did not willfully favor Real Madrid. There is an unconscious bias in favor of the stronger team or the receiving team, often in favor of Bayern Munich.

For those who blame Viktor Kassai for the bad offside calls, it is not him who signals the offsides but the line referees. Now consider how they need to do this: they have to move as fast as the last defender, while keeping themselves in line, and at the same time keep an eye on the offense players (often more than one) while keeping an eye on the ball is so that they may judge at the exact moment when the ball is kicked whether the offense was in off-side position. Sometimes the kick happpens in their back just as they are running to keep in line. Good luck with the call. So why not just admit that the job is intrinsically difficult and tolerate imperfection ? Players are allowed mistakes, why not referees ?

Quite a few unbiased commenters I know mentioned that Vidal indeed did not deserve a second yellow card, but actually had deserved the red card for his first foul.

Keep the video away from soccer (other than goal calls) lest it affects one of its critical features : uninterrupted play which requires an excellent physical condition.

It is not referees which are the cause of the frustration, it is the financial consequences. There is just too much money involved for the clubs.

Referees are routinely overwhelmed by the game. Howard Webb was regarded as the best in the world until he completely ruined the 2010 World Cup Final.

The decision to send off a player or not is where referees crack most often. In 2010, Holland adopted a strategy betting that Webb would resist "ruining" the final by sending off a player, particularly in the first half. Exhibit A, Nigel de Jong cleating Xabi Alonso squarely in the chest. It is a red card as clearly as the rules of the game can express. Excessive force, recklessly dangerous, with no regard for the safety of an opponent. Webb's cowardly yellow was permission for anarchy to ensue, and it did.
Kassai was running toward Casemiro with his hand reaching for his pocket after his cynical foul on Robben, whose own diving history might have colored Kassai's decisionmaking. Yet Kassai got his hand away from his pocket when he realized he had already booked Casemiro. Yes, Vidal could have walked earlier himself, but 10 v. 10 would have been a more just way to play out the match than casiering Vidal for a totally clean tackle, and not sanctioning Casemiro.
There was no excuse for the same linesman to blow two offside calls, both in
Real's favor. Marcelo clearly played Lewandowski onside, and there is no excuse for blowing the tie winning offside goal by Ronaldo.

I did not see the game, but the complaint was that two goals resulted from uncalled players being off-side. I always thought that the assistant referees on the sidelines are supposed to be in position to and make off-side calls. It is not the chief referee who can, given his position on the field. So you should not blame the chief referee for those calls (or no-calls). The red card is another story and I will not comment as I did not see the game.

Here is my question, why hasn't soccer allowed video reviews? This game is one of countless examples where soccer needs video reviews. You can't put that much pressure on the officials. They are in a hostlie invorment and have to make calls in a blink of an eye. If they had some help, they could be more confident and not make calls based on who is home.

The red card in the first game and the red card in the second game were the pivotal calls in both games and both were wrong. Why does no one mention the acting of Ronaldo in the first game that resulted in that joke of a red card. Not sure what Casemiro would have had to do to get a card. Playing with 10 men, Munich went from dominating to trying to minimize the damage. The penalty awarded Munich was debatable. The offside calls were truly terrible, though, with the bad call on Lewandowski being so late (and wrong) as to be laughable, as indeed the Madrid supporter just behind the side ref did. It also appears offside doesn't apply when Ronaldo gets the ball.

The reality is that the money has become so large that they need to get these games properly and accurately called. Use video to double-check all goals for offsides and the ball crossing the goal line (in use many places). Also require its use for any red cards. A sending off completely changes a match. Clubs should also be able to appeal blatant non-calls. Players are clever with many divers (Ronaldo in particular) that changes the game as well. Give a team 10 minutes to appeal for a red card with a video official making the call (if a foul would only amount to a yellow, it should not be exercised). It would also be nice to consider post-match cards for egregious fouls that are not called. Why should a player get away with dangerous play without consequences. It would change behavior for the better. Finally, a team should be able to halt play for a rules error, which we are being to see crop up in England.

There is no way to reverse a misjudged offside call that will be fair and missed yellow cards are also not worth exploring as all these changes affect the pace & flow of the match.

Exactly right. Crybaby coaches are a factor in our under-nine-year-old divisions, too.

Soccer is a continuous sport. The day we go to video refereeing is the day the game dies.

Regards,
JV

What a comeuppance for Bayern, a team not really used to losing -- Even with their strong defensive duo Jerome Boateng & Mats Hummels back on the field after injuries and killer striker Robert Lewandowski, whose hat-tricks have almost become routine, they were no match for Ronaldo who was on fire!
But it's really too bad Phillip Lahm and Xabi Alonso, after long and brilliant careers, have to retire with the memory of a loss out of the Champions League.....Schade, but Alles gute, Jungs!

Yes human error are a part of the sport. Sometimes that adds to the intrigue... But this was blatant favoritism toward Real Madrid!! Saying the game is faster (not by much - c'mon) is a cop out. Ronaldo's second goal was clearly offside!! It wasn't even close!! That completed deflated Bayern - who unjustly was playing down a man! The refereeing was as bad as an NBA playoff game.

Real Madrid "won" nothing.

Everyone who follows the game is grappling with the issue that it is impossible to referee accurately. Every game has mis-calls for offsides because it requires the linesman to be looking in two places at the same moment. I am of two minds. Technology can definitely improve the situation, as goal-detection has proved. But there is also something timeless about the flow of the game with its imperfections and unexpected twists. Perhaps it tutors us on the uncontrollable vagaries of life itself.

Soccer at its highest level has unfortunately become a game of chance. Even the very best referees are utterly incapable of properly officiating a match. The players are too fast and too skillful. Soccer is played on a pitch that is approximately the same size as a U.S. football field with 11 players to a side and is a nearly constant-action sport (while U.S. features 11-12 minutes of action), yet U.S. football has EIGHT referees, all with full authority to call penalties, while soccer has ONE referee and two to four useless milquetoast "referees' assistants." In an ultra-low-scoring sport, refereeing errors are magnified and increase the likelihood that these errors will change the outcome of the game. Poor Mr. Kassai is not incompetent or corrupt, he's simply trying to perform an impossible task. The fault lies not with him but with the traditionalists at FIFA, UEFA, the English FA, etc., who all undoubtedly still arrive at work every day on horseback because, you know, it worked just fine 150 years ago.

Video would help in correcting some of his mistakes last night, but not all. His decisions regarding not to give Casemiro a second yellow and to give Vidal a second (for something that wasn't even a foul) would not be reviewed. Starting with the Casemiro incident, the ref's performance went steadily downhill...wow, just wow.

Vidal's red card was the strangest I have ever seen. His sliding tackle clearly got the ball, and only the ball. He did not even make contact with his opponent, who subsequently ran into Vidal's legs and tumbled.

Rory Smith's attempt to say that the referee made mistakes on both sides is simply wrong. Robben was clearly kicked in the legs inside the penalty zone. Yes, he fell spectacularly, as Robben often does, but all theatrics aside it is still a penalty. And Zidane's claim that Bayern's second goal was from an offside position is ridiculous; it was a clear own goal by Real.

Referees have clearly a tremendous influence on the game, and in this case it was disastrous. I am not sure that video replays are the answer either.

If they can't get off side right in the Champions League I hate to think how badly it is called at lower levels. Soccer should follow (field) hockey's lead and drop off side from the rules.

The ref didn't throw the game to Real Madrid. He lobbed it to them.

It was painful to watch these blunders in a well-played, energetic game: unusual to see such a preponderance of errors on crucial plays and, on balance, clearly favoring one side. Troubling, too, that the offside call on Ronaldo was missed shortly after he had complained about a correct offside call.

After 6 years of living in London and enjoying education and exposure to football, I can make a few observations (with poor grammar). Great game. Incredible athletes. Irrepressible cheaters. If refs didn't need to spend so much time watching for rampant play acting, they could catch the more obvious infractions. The "Hand of God" lives and the home team never cheats. Still, the best game going. Acting, crummy refs, elation, disappointment and the cry of "next yer" cannot be avoided.

I think the MLS should ask Viktor Kassai to referee. And ask his linesmen crew to come over as well.

They'd fit right in with that sort of performance.

What a shambles. Bayern Muchen was playing not only a very good Real Madrid, but also the officials. What when from a difficult task became impossible.

The first game the refereeing was a bit iffy. The second was so bad as to appear to be almost biased and makes me want to start looking into the bank accounts of the officiating crew.