Unforgettable Soccer. Luciano Wernicke
penalty to the visiting squad, and Butt went running with his head held high straight to the rival’s penalty box to take charge of the play. With a high right cross, the goalkeeper beat his opponent Christofer Heimeroth and was euphoric, embracing all his teammates to celebrate the 1-3 score. The arrogant Butt not only lost a lot of time with his celebration, but he celebrated on his own ground, which allowed the local forward Mike Hanke to restart the game with a direct kick from the center spot, which went directly into the unguarded visitor’s net. The clumsy Butt could celebrate, at least, that the match ended with his team still victorious.
ACCELERATED COMPLAINT
It is unlikely there was ever a penalty call that was not protested. If the players don’t complain, the coaches do. The fans, of course, always complain. But without doubt, the most unparalleled protest was the unusual revenge that a Yugoslav league soccer player attempted to exact from referee Platon Rejinac in 1965. Rejinac had dared to call the maximum penalty possible against Fudbalski Klub Crvena Zvezda Beograd (Red Star of Belgrade) just one minute from the end of the match and with the score tied. While ten of the players surrounded Rejinac to insult the honor of his entire family, the eleventh member of the victimized team left the field through a side door in apparent calm. However, what seemed like cool apathy soon turned into madness: The player got behind the wheel of his car, drove into the stadium, destroying the fence in the process, and began to chase the referee across the field in an attempt to run him over. After a few minutes of astonishing tension, the incensed player was subdued by the police and eventually sentenced to two years in prison for “attempted homicide.” Humorously, the soccer association of Yugoslavia only suspended the player for two years.
SOLD OUT
On March 14, 1936, Bradford City AFC and Doncaster Rovers FC were prepared to face each other in the English Second Division. The two teams were on the field, but the game was delayed: One of the line judges hadn’t shown up at Valley Parade. The referee in charge of the match tried to find a replacement, but there was no one in the area who would agree to act as an assistant. When the referee announced that the match would be canceled, the visiting player George Flowers—who had traveled as a substitute but had been left off the field, since changes were not authorized at that time—offered to replace the absentee assistant referee. At the end of the game, the Doncaster players weren’t too pleased with their partner Flowers. First, because they had lost 3 to 1 without any help from him; second, because they returned home with less money in their pockets than their pal—they had received 1 pound and 10 shillings each for having been defeated, while Flowers was paid a regular lineman’s salary for a match of 1 pound, 11 shillings, and 6 pennies.
ADVICE
Many field players have guarded the goal during penalty kicks around the world, having had to replace red-carded or injured goalies. None of these feats received such remarkable help like the save made by the Chilean defender Cristian Álvarez on October 12, 2002. In the middle of a heated match between Universidad Católica and Universidad de Chile, tied 1-1, the referee Carlos Chandía granted a penalty kick for the away team of Universidad de Chile. The goalkeeper, Jonathan Walker, could not defend his goal because he had gotten hurt during a violent clash against his rival, Mauricio Pinilla.
As the Catholic squad had already made the three substitutions allowed, Álvarez put on his gloves to face the designated kicker, Pedro González. Seconds before whistling to authorize the penalty kick, Chandía put his mouth to Álvarez’s ear, and said, imprudently, “to your left you should go, go to your left.” And so Álvarez did. The defender-turned-goalie dove to that side and saved the shot. The story had a happy ending for Universidad Católica, but not for Chandía. As his inappropriate advice had been captured by the television’s microphones that surrounded the pitch, the unusual mishap spread through the media and ignited a national scandal. The following day, the National Association of Professional Soccer determined, after evaluating the case, that, although the referee could not know for sure where González’s shot would eventually go, his irresponsibility and his big mouth definitely cost him a match fine.
THE AMBASSADOR’S ASSIST
The Argentine triumph over the Peruvian team in the last game of the Copa América (organized in Lima in 1927) happened with a strange play that should have been canceled by the Uruguayan referee Victorio Gariboni. Before the match—which took place on November 27 at the National Stadium in Lima in front of some 15,000 people—began, the authorities had arranged for the United States ambassador in Peru, Miles Poindexter, to give the “initial kick,” a diplomatic formality very common at that time throughout the world and in most sports.
At the appointed time and with the two teams arranged on the pitch, each in its half, Poindexter kicked the ball into the Argentine field toward the visiting players wearing that day a sky-blue shirt crossed by a horizontal white stripe. The ball reached defender Humberto Recanatini’s feet, and, without stopping the action, he executed a long kick to Peruvian territory. The striker Manuel “Nolo” Ferreira, who had sprinted to the rival half, dominated the ball and, to the surprise of the host defenders, who did not move a muscle to stop their action, sent a shot into the goal defended by Jorge Pardón. The Peruvian players protested, but the referee Gariboni validated the conquest because he mistakenly assumed that the match had begun with the touch of Poindexter.
FORGETFUL REFS
On May 6, 2009, when Rosenborg Ballklub received Fredrikstad F.K. during the seventh round of the Norwegian First Division, the referee Per Ivar Staberg left the traditional coin used to determine which team takes first in his locker room. Instead of returning to the dressing room and delaying the start of the match, Staberg had an original idea: to invite the two captains, Mikael Dorsin and Hans Erik Ramberg, to play the traditional children’s game “rock, paper, scissors” to determine the winner. This proved to be entertaining for the 15,000 spectators, who had fun seeing how Ramberg needed three attempts (in the first two they had both chosen the same option) to win their right to draw first.
Another clueless ref, Oscar Sequeira, had to expel the Paraguayan Celso Ayala of CA River Plate vocally on August 31, 1997, a day in which the “millionaire” team lost at home, 1-3, to CA Rosario Central in the Argentine League. Why? Because he had forgotten his red card in the wardrobe. The Paraguayan defender took it all in stride: “Actually, I did not understand anything; they red-carded me without taking out the red card!” he commented after the game with a smile.
THE UNDECIDED
Regulation authorizes the referee to modify his decision only if he realizes that it is incorrect, or if he deems it necessary, after a suggestion from an assistant referee or the fourth referee, provided he has not resumed the game or finished the match. This provision could be very useful except that it is often abused, and the consequence can be detrimental, as seen during a soccer match in Israel in August 2009.
That day, during the second half of the First Division duel between Maccabi Tel Aviv FC and Bnei Sakhnin FC, referee Assaf Kenan validated a goal from home side Maccabi, scored by the Armenian Ilya Yavruyan, the third for him that day, sealing a 3 to 1 victory. However, seconds later and at the request of one of his assistant referees, Kenan called a foul by a Maccabi player in the play prior to the goal. But, following the host players’ vehement protests, including insults, the referee changed his decision again, validated Yavruyan’s goal, and ordered the match to be resumed from the center spot.
The new call then ignited the Sakhnin players, who pounced on the referee, who complained, severely and amid threats to withdraw from the field, and demanded the ref remain firm in voiding the goal. The soft Kenan yielded once again to the claims and arranged for