Halsey still says it was a pen.

[Piccsnumberoneblue]

Saw Mark Halsey tonight at Piccadilly Station. Had a quick chat and had to ask him what was going at The Sty last week giving Young a pen when he clearly swallow dived. His first defence was that he saw contact and therefore it was a penalty no matter how theatrical Young was. I asked him that having seen replays of the incident would he still give it? He fudged a little saying he hadn't seen it but then went on to say that on MOTD they had agreed it was a penalty...Hmmm. I suggested that the BBC wouldn't like to upset Bacon Face so merely agreed with him, this got a 'possibly' out of him.
His fall back point became (citing Carlos Tevez's booking at Carrow Rd) "Damned if you do damned if you don't"

On the plus side, he remembers having a super time with Blues after the play off final, he is in rude health and when I suggested giving the Shite a real howler of a decision against them in any of their final games, should he be reffing them, he didn't say "No". I did point out he could always placate Bacon by telling him, "these things even out over the season"

Seemed a really nice bloke, but desperately trying to justify a real carve up of a decision at the swamp.

[john68]

I still haven't worked out this "there was contact" issue. Football is a contact sport, if a player touches another, it does not mean it is a foul, Players regularly make contact with each other during a game and nobody would ever consider it to be a foul. So why does this apply in the area.

There is nothing in the laws of the game game that even mentions contact. It mentions methods or intentions to foul. If a defender is static and an attacker runs into him and falls over. It's the attackers fault.

[Tokyo Blue]

It is a soundbite dealt out to fans to reassure us that bent refs are really straight and their decisions are correct and not biased in any way. Nothing more.

[Piccsnumberoneblue]

I still haven't worked out this "there was contact" issue. Football is a contact sport, if a player touches another, it does not mean it is a foul, Players regularly make contact with each other during a game and nobody would ever consider it to be a foul. So why does this apply in the area.

There is nothing in the laws of the game game that even mentions contact. It mentions methods or intentions to foul. If a defender is static and an attacker runs into him and falls over. It's the attackers fault.

This contact nonsense drives me wild too. I did suggest that Young had thrown his leg out to initiate said contact, but I suppose refs get grief about individual decisions from nutters on railway platforms all the time so they naturally get defensive.
I can forgive Halsey a lot for his Wembley efforts in coming to our rescue in the darkest of hours. He seemed pleased I asked about his health too.
Finally he was smaller than I imagined, and looked remarkably like a shorthouse version of Niall Quinn.

[BlueMoonAwoken]

I do think in real time it might of looked like a pen to the ref, people have said it stopped a goal scoring opportunity but i think young knocked it too far ahead of him hence why he had to make the dive so theatrical because he knew he wasnt getting to it. Even when goal line tech comes in that wont stop referees making bad decisions on the pitch.... For me i think they should use technology for penaltys, goal line and serious fouls (leg breakers). Then the rest can be down to the ref. If a team forces the ref to look at an incident and the ref thinks its not a goal, foul or penalty then they lose challenges to appeal again through the game.... I dont know how they will work it etc but id like it like that.

[Beefymcfc]

Was he on his way back from the Swamp?

The telling thing in that conversation was that he hadn't seen the replay. I'm not sure I believe him on this and he's using it as an excuse to still say it was a penalty because if he'd seen it then surely he'd see it was a dive. However, if he's really not seen it then I'm absolutely flabbergasted and it shows how contemptable these referee's are.

In any walk of life or in any career, if people are questioning your decisions then you have to go back to that decision making process and see if it could have been done any other way to ensure the outcome was correct or for you to correct your approach so that you don't make the same mistake again. In the light of such public demand it would only be right for an individual to go back and review his decision and with the aid of footage (which we don't have in other aspects unless you are a Porn Star) it only seems reasonable to do so.

If this is what is happening and neither the referee or the Ref's Association are sitting down and reviewing these cases then it says to me that:

a. They are not bothered with what mistakes they could've made

b. They have little respect for the trade they continue to ply.

c. There is a possibility that they don't need to look as the outcome was foregone.

And people wonder why the state of refereeing doesn't get any better, there's your answer, right there.

[Mase]

Met him a few years ago. Seems like a decent guy and we had a joke about Gillingham at Wembley. You never bump in to the horrible cuntish refs though do you just randomly?? I'd love to bump in to Foy or Lee Mason.

[Beefymcfc]

Met him a few years ago. Seems like a decent guy and we had a joke about Gillingham at Wembley. You never bump in to the horrible cuntish refs though do you just randomly?? I'd love to bump [strike]in to[/strike] off Foy or Lee Mason.

Fixed.

[dazby]

I used to be an indoor cricket umpire. I'd get people abusing me for all decisions: the ones where I knew I was right and the ones I knew I got wrong. But, you just got back on the horse and called another game. At the time my vision was better than 20:20 so I had the confidence that if I was focussed I'd do a good job. It was just a matter of being focussed.

Has this got anything to do with the thread? Probably not.

[brite blu sky]

Great OP piccs, nice one for taking him to task on it.

[s1ty m]

I still haven't worked out this "there was contact" issue. Football is a contact sport, if a player touches another, it does not mean it is a foul, Players regularly make contact with each other during a game and nobody would ever consider it to be a foul. So why does this apply in the area.

There is nothing in the laws of the game game that even mentions contact. It mentions methods or intentions to foul. If a defender is static and an attacker runs into him and falls over. It's the attackers fault.

Agreed. It's totally daft.