Refwatch: West Brom F.A. Cup

[bcubed]

It seems to me that every ref who comes to the Madstad is rated as terrible on here. The fact is we are biased and think every decision should go our way. The truth is he is a top class ref and arguably got all the major decisons right yesterday. Let us give some credit when we do get a good ref as some of the Championship ones really are dire.

Will let you know when I see one - didn't see anything of the kind on Saturday
And it's nothing to do with bias - the decisions were poor for both teams

[The Real Sandhurst Royal]

Andrew1957 wrote:

It seems to me that every ref who comes to the Madstad is rated as terrible on here. The fact is we are biased and think every decision should go our way. The truth is he is a top class ref and arguably got all the major decisons right yesterday. Let us give some credit when we do get a good ref as some of the Championship ones really are dire.

The sending offs were correct but Mr. Foy continued to wave play on with both sides intent on wrestling each other in the middle of the pitch. Many fouls from both sides went unnoticed which as a fan I find very frustrating.

[Silver Fox]

It seemed at half time that he hadn't given either side a free kick in the first 45 minutes despite a few tugs and niggles by both sides. However he didn't seem to favour either time so no real problem there. Second half he got bothe red cards absolutely spot on, Shaun went over the top of the ball and this of course led to the biggest LOLz of the day as the north stand booed a straightforward decision that was right under their collective noses. Their chap going may have seemed rough from a baggies point of view but if you're on a yellow (which I seem to remember being well deserved, if surprising given Foy's tactics in the first half) don't drag an opposition player back right in front of the ref.

Pretty OK performance really but yeah, we really shouldn't have these proper refs doing or little games between 2 championship sides What does the poster who suggested that think should happen when a prem and a championship side meet? 2 refs? A half each?

[The Real Sandhurst Royal]

Silver Fox wrote:

What does the poster who suggested that think should happen when a prem and a championship side meet? 2 refs? A half each?

An ideal opportunity for the top Championship referees to be tested and put in the spotlight to see if they are good enough to be promoted to the premiership list at somepoint in the future.

[The Surgeon of Crowthorne]

One thing no-one else has picked up on is that the first yellow given to Mulumbu (I think it was his card but it could have been the one given to Tamas) appeared to be driven solely by the crowd's reaction. He didn't look like he was going to card it at all until a large portion of the East stand were protesting so loudly that the card finally came out.

[Elmer Park]

I think Steve Coppell used to dislike it when we had a Premiership ref for Championship matches because they definitely have a different way of interpreting the laws and let much more shirt pulling and holding offences go. This was clearly the case on Saturday and did give the impression that Foy wasn't particular focussed on the game in the first half. I think after Shane's challenge he realised he had better keep the lid on things more and started refereeing what I would call 'properly' and did get most of the decisions correct in my view.

I do agree however with Surgeon because he had no intention of booking Mulumbu until the crowd roared even though the challenge looked a very poor one.

All in all although his first half performance annoyed me I would much rather have Foy refereeing a match of ours than Mr Langford from the Plymouth match.

As for Shane's challenge it would have been interesting to see what Foy would have done if Shane's trailing leg hadn't caught their player as, although it would still have been a red card offence, it would have been a much more difficult call especially as at that stage he was trying to be very lenient.

[bcubed]

One thing no-one else has picked up on is that the first yellow given to Mulumbu (I think it was his card but it could have been the one given to Tamas) appeared to be driven solely by the crowd's reaction. He didn't look like he was going to card it at all until a large portion of the East stand were protesting so loudly that the card finally came out.

That's exactly right
Very unusual for Reading fans to have an influence over a ref but that clearly happened here
Another example of poor refereeing in my view - he decided it was not worthy of a card and then changed his mind due to the crowd reaction - very weak