Filed under: FIFA World Cup, Brazil, Slovenia, United States
PRETORIA, South Africa — In the wake of what the Western world judged in the World Cup to be the most egregious job of sports officiating it witnessed in the history of the 19 days since baseball umpire Jim Joyce blew Armando Gallaraga’s perfect game, an amazing thing happened Monday morning at a high-school soccer pitch on the northern edge of the Johannesburg-Pretoria megalopolis: the World Cup referees were exposed to the World Cup media. Again.
We got to watch them hone their skills in workouts they go through, according to a FIFA (the international soccer governing body) official, several times a week. It was nothing to write home about, though I have.
We got to watch their bosses grade their practice calls on video. It was more show than substance.
We got to spend half an hour chatting with any of them we wished about everything except, on orders of FIFA, the controversial calls they or their brethren made since this tournament commenced 10 days ago. That was worthwhile, nonetheless.
“We don’t talk about [Koman] Coulibaly,” Inacio Candido, who introduced himself to me as Manuel, said quietly and with a gentle smile when I asked him about the Malian referee who nullified the U.S.’s potential game-winning goal against Slovenia.
Candido, an Angolan, was one of Coulibaly’s two assistants for the U.S. game. Coulibaly wasn’t in attendance after serving as an alternate for a match the day before. Only the referees and assistants who already had a day off were required to be at Monday’s workout and exposed to cross-examination, tailored though it was. Stephane Lannoy from France, who on Sunday missed Luis Fabiano’s hand ball in Brazil’s 3-1 win over Ivory Coast, and disqualified Fabiano’s teammate Kaka, was not in attendance, either. Convenient? Of course.
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Mon, Jun 21, 2010
World Cup Headlines