Coaches are Screwing up and Refs are ruining the World Cup

[JaytodaP]

I am getting incredibly angry with all of the diving and just downright horrible calls going on in this years world cup. Its getting ridiculous. Players from a lot of teams are diving, and getting calls and winning games unfairly. Pimpong for example, dives inside of the box to get a PK to win the game. Bull Crap. Send him off for diving. Most european teams (mainly Italy and Portugal) throw on the academy awards while playing soccer/football. They will slip and fall and get a free kick. Brazil is another team that loves to dive. It's horrible how one Bull<img src="/xxx.gif"><img src="/xxx.gif"><img src="/xxx.gif"><img src="/xxx.gif"> call changes the whole outcome.
Oh yeah anyone catch USA vs Italy? The cards on USA weren't deserved at all. Pope's fouls were dives.
Mastroeni shoulda got a yellow

Now the coaches, I'm just pissed off at bruce arena. Who the hell plays a 4-5-1 if you need to score goals? How about a 4-3-3 or 4-4-2 dumbass?

P.S. Kasey Keller sucks ass.

[Psychotic]

On the whole, the refereeing in the World Cup has been rather good, but with so many decisions to make, there will always be errors. A way to stop this would be video refereeing, but FIFA are extremely opposed to this, presumably so they can't give smaller nations an unfair advantage, for example South Korea in 2002 (and perhaps Ghana in 2006, because that was not a penalty. We'll see how they fare against Brazil)

Oh, and 4-5-1 is essentially the same formation as 4-3-3. If the opponents are attacking, the wingers fall back and it becomes a 4-5-1, and when you break into a counter attack, your wingers push forward (and the one on the opposite flank to where the ball is goes into the centre to support the main striker) and it becomes 4-3-3.

[DeathKnight]

Like I said before, FIFA has the worst reffs EVER.

[Resha]

They're only human. Give them a break.

[Bart's Friend Milhouse]

the referee will always have a tough job but more often then not they get some crucial decision spot on. I reckon FIFA have to toughen up on such issues like diving (i.e. fining). In my opinion a player is doing himself no favour in diving anyway. The whole world is watching the world cup and by diving he is only showing how dishonest he is.
As for the USA/Italy game I thought all three red cards were justified. Masteroni went in with both feet showing a clean pair of studs and the only thing I might remember about eddie pope after he reitres is the amount of bookings he got in previous world cups.
I thought Bruce Arena did a marvellous job with the US soccer team in 2002 and if it wasn't for Torsten Frings they could have been reached the semis. However not picking Friedel as your no 1 goalie just puzzles me (unless he was injured???).

[Psychotic]

Friedel has retired from international football.

[eestlinc]

I don't think the Ghana bad pentaly call matters so much since the US team is too bad to actually win a game against a good team anyway.

[Bart's Friend Milhouse]

Friedel has retired from international football.

Oh...didn't know that
But he can always back down from that decision like Henrik Larsson

[DK]

The biggest coaching cockup so far has been a certain baldy taking only four strikers. One who is Theo Walcott.

[Old Manus]

Somebody isn't happy about the USA result...

[tailz]

i agree with the whole referees part anyone see netherlands-argentinia yesterday?

how many unfair cards did we (netherlands) get i mean that one of kuyt wasnt even a foul let alone something to pull a card for.

and players dive way to easily nowadays i actually cheer when a attacker doesnt "fall"after he get a little nudge

[Psychotic]

Here's a video for all you diving fans to enjoy!

It features that spoof training session from that awesome Guardian advert (The Guardian? Awesome? I feel dirty) My favourite dive on there is probably Samuel Eto'o's against Atletico Madrid, because he actually manages to look at the referee before he even hits the ground.

[tailz]

oh my god i always suspected that they trained on that but serieusly everyone here who plays football himself know no one falls that easily wwhy then do the referees fail to see it.

[JaytodaP]

I hope you guys know im not just complaining about the usa result because that is mostly the team's fault. (coughLANDON DONOVANcough) But a lot of teams are diving, and recieving calls that are crucial to the result of games. Like that dude said on the diving video, "if you wanna be an actor, move to Hollywood." Its just getting annoying, its obvious, and the refs are missing it. Thats their job to make good calls. They get paid to do that. The world cup just isnt entertaining as much any more.

If you think i am angry now, you could only imagine how angry i was last world cup USA v Germany with that handball in the goal by some defender. I started throwing things

thank you psychotic for posting those videos.

[Bart's Friend Milhouse]

Anthony Sanneh's dive in the Germany/USA match four years ago is the grandaddy of all dives