Officiating...

Today's non-announcement that our favorite referee from Mali was not on the list for upcoming matches in South Africa was not much of a surprise.  And good for FIFA for recognizing that any match in which Mr. Coulibaly is the Center is going to be controversial at this point,  not good for the game nor for the the hapless referee.  Interesting to note that the AR who was apparently at the sideline when the Edu goal was nullified is named Candido.  God help us if it turns out that Voltaire's been reincarnated and is making a modern version of his classic with the pitch as a metaphor for the "best of all possible worlds".  Candido will certainly be disillusioned!   Okay...but what's worse than a ref who makes horrible calls is the ref who never shows up.   Our guys had to suffer through playing the Highland Stillhouse crew in their new imported finery (South American uniforms with hand sewn patches for heaven sake!)  without the benefit of a referee.   Okay...so it is true that the notorious Italian soccer madman and cordon bleu chef,  Paolo Ruffi,  took the whistle and kept some curb on the game.   Fact of the matter is it didn't stop Stillhouse from outscoring us.   So it goes...

On a related subject today's paper had a very poignant article entitled, "Diving makes it hard on referees, fans, foes".  The piece made the case that theatrical acrobatics on the pitch hurt the reputation of the game and that there's a lot of that going on, etc.   Yeah,  I agree, but then there are the moments when you get to see the slow mo of the Cote d'Ivoire player's boot sliding, cleats up, straight into Elano's mid-calf as the Brazilian attempts a sweeping slide tackle.  Or the image of English cleats launched straight into Tim Howard's thorax at full throttle.   Diving not good,  but let's remember there's some effort to protect the players going on as well.   

My last lament of the day was that I listened to the "noted" local soccer commentator,  John Canzano give an "interview" to one of the sports talking heads from KGW late on Sunday night.  In the three minutes before I clicked over to CSI something,  Canzano said he was disappointed by this World Cup because it seemed everyone was not playing to win but just trying not to lose.

And so that wasn't going to win him or anyone else over to soccer.   I dunno.  I'd say that's

defense,  and, yes,  much of it's been tougher this year.   Maybe he only saw the North Koreans. My experience in the game is that teams who rush forward impetuously generally pay a price in the back of their net.  It aint as easy as it looks.  And one more time,   soccer isn't just interesting because of the score.   A bigger pile of....well, it's just a bigger pile.  Not better.