34 SENURU Wegereef
What an absolutely incredible game that Jan Wegereef had to face in his World Cup début between Senegal and Uruguay; the match of his life. This, too, a match of juxtapositions - it was a death trap for any referee, even the baldy Italian would have struggled to have come through this match unscathed. Wegereef all the while showed the ability to handle these and even harder games, in this impossible to read match the referee from the Netherlands was certainly tripped up - unlike Diouf and Morales...
There is so much to say about this game! It's best to partition the analysis into tactical approach, style and Key Match Incident sections:
Tactical Approach
-> Watching the two previous games played by Senegal and Uruguay, Wegereef's tactical approach to issue early cautions was certainly an astute one. However, save for the caution at 3' that nowadays would be an SFP, one can perhaps wonder if the could have turned out differently had the referee taken the risk and not issued cautions. On the one hand, it was a brilliant tactical choice and the rough and tactical fouls as a matter of course for the game were more-or-less stopped (caution count shows they continued later); on the other, it left him a bit disarmed for later in the match. A lose-lose situation for him.
-> After that, he seemed to lose his motivation a bit for the rest of the first half, he missed a small handful of very clear fouls; for instance, the penultimate card of the half could certainly have been avoided if he whistled the clear foul on the defender first. Maybe he was frustrated that he was binded to his very rigorous approach until the end of the half.
-> In the second half, referee totally changed his tack. By his line in the first half, he missed four clear cautions for tactical / reckless fouls. Actually, this was excellent game-reading as each no card was optimal on a management level, but it hardly presented the best impression either.
I would add this was the nightmare game for a referee: very intense, almost no flow or rhythm at all.
Style
Wegereef's style was one of the best I have ever seen. It is no exaggeration to say that. Very elegant movement and gestures, brilliant mimics, and formidable natural authority. In years to come, his style would have been absolutely perfect for the more management-orientated refereeing of nowadays. He kept control of this game, in spite of the decisions that he took! Maybe one would have to watch the whole game to see what I mean, but I thought he absolutely excelled in this field, my compliments.
Key Match Incidents
Besides anything else I wrote, the upshot of the game is that Wegereef was fooled by two simulations in the penalty area.
On replay, the simulations don't even look that convincing - I think the reality is very different. In real time, these were two brilliantly executed simulations. Diouf's I reckon would have been spotted if he were running vertically, but his lateral running offered very little chance for the referee to detect it, as the area of (non-)contact was outside the referee's vision - he was also catching up ground as the situation arouse from an astray pass to the goalkeeper. Morales' is perhaps the best I've ever seen! He managed to fall at exactly the right moment he would have been tripped, despite being on the wrong side of the tackle; one would think it was a penalty, just because it would not be logical for someone to craft such a well performed dive.
They remain pretty unacceptable mistakes at a World Cup level, but I dare say it would take quite a brilliant referee to spot them both.
Overall
Wegereef was in my mind very unlucky on a number of counts, but it is unescapable that in the end he lost control of his decisions (though not the game) and realised a very poor performance. His mark reflects that.
The same cannot be said for his assistant referees, who had to face an incredibly challenging match, with swathes of offside decisions to compute. Jaap Pool especially was on for a very, very (very) high mark - absolutely incredible onside for the 3-0 goal, which he also had to spot crossed the line - but unfortunately he made an important mistake at 85' (- 0,2); Ferenc Székely only had one of his many situations replayed, so it is hard to evaluate his performance as better than 'just' very good.
Kýros Vassáras did very well to prevent further escalation just before half time; good job.
| Jan Wegereef - 7,5 Jaap Pool - 8,6 Ferenc Székely - 8,5 Kýros Vassáras (NED, NED, HUN) | Senegal 3-3 Uruguay Group Stage |
 Camara (2.) - Tackle Daf (4.) - Tackle Coly (39.) - SPA (Tackle) Diop (69.) - Delaying the Restart Diouf (82.) - Dissent Fadiga (87.) - Delaying the Restart Beye (87.) - SPA (Tackle) | Romero (8.) - SPA (Tripping) Carini (19.) - SPA (Tripping) García (35.) - Tackle Rodríguez (40.) - Simulation Montero (82.) - SPA (Holding) |
I fear only the highlights do not do this performance full justice, lots of simple, but important interactions, management and foul calls must remain missing from them of course. To that effect, my impressions are limited.
ReplyDeleteI definitely liked his approach to be strict, it was a good idea considering both teams had shown to be quite intense in their first two group matches. I couldn't find much fault with any of the given cautions in fact. Several scenes in the second half (57', 63', 68', 75', 81') could have yielded further cards, but I would not argue that not giving them there were indefensible.
As for crucial match scenes, two very crucial mistakes remain: both penalties were no fouls, but (well executed) dives. Wegereef was heavily criticized and if anyone remembers this match, it is for his high amount of cards, which in this case tells us little. He had a good appraoch, but this near-unmangeable match overwhelmed him in the crucial scenes.
He got dealt with a hard hand, did his best, had his plans: but like any plans they did not survive reality for long. If anything, I pity him how things turned out for him. By no means a bad referee.