Aston Villa - v - Leeds United ***Matchday Thread***

[ozleeds]

Man, this referee is the most honest going around. Came from Australia with a clean reputation and watched him referred a world cup game between Greece and I can't remember who and my mum who wasn't a sports person was watching it with me and she said who is the referee he is really good.
This guy is a gem so if you think he's bad I would hate to see the locals refs.

[spaldy]

Oz,

it's worth watching the game replay if you get a chance. great game.

watch it and then report how honest and good he is. Pay special attention to the no calls. while I'm certainly no fan of a whistle happy control freak running a game I also understand when a team is playing the body versus challenging for the ball. No calls, in essence, become a partial bias.

Of course, credit to Garrard to have his playing physically push us around and taking it to the next level when the ref didn't call anything. Not really MB"s style to tell his players to play goon ball and our small sized squad as well a very undersized line up don't work well for us. The last 15 minutes could have been 2-3 reds and he lost control of a great game.

[bathlad61]

A good battling performance, well worth a point. With both teams totally done in, maybe a lively Gelhardt for the last 10 would have been worth a go. Everton game feels even more important now, with four tough matches in a row coming up.

[hopelesslyoptimistic]

Yeah agreed - 3 points against the toffees would be nice and allow us to relax a little against the better teams.

Spuds look a little open at the back so we may get something out of that but not sure about the other games in that run

[denver11]

I fancy us to beat Everton but ye never know what Leeds will turn up. How the hell did barcodes beat us?? Frank will be terrified. MB is a tactical beast compared to Lamps. Even his multi million pound Chelsea squad took until injury time to secure a 3-1 win, which he celebrated like the classless p rick he is. When Derby beat us in the play offs that was nothing to do with Frank. We shot ourselves in the foot ump**** times that game. I fancy(hope) Frank Lampards Everton won't be able to cope with Bielsas game. Why does he bring Roberts on before Joffy, it really puzzles me. Joofy doesn't get a game for the u23s as he's kept for PL games, then doesn't even get game. Young lads want to play footy, not sit on the bench. I'd rather keep Joffy happy than Roberts. If this keeps up Joffy will be on his way.

[hopelesslyoptimistic]

I hope the away end is full of binoculars

[Orgoner]

Man, this referee is the most honest going around. Came from Australia with a clean reputation and watched him referred a world cup game between Greece and I can't remember who and my mum who wasn't a sports person was watching it with me and she said who is the referee he is really good.
This guy is a gem so if you think he's bad I would hate to see the locals refs.

I thought he was doing okay up until the last ten minutes or so, when he started to let the game slip, possibly because of the reasons Spaldy outlined after your original post.

There were definitely a couple of times where players seemed to have taken more than a minor knock where I think he would've done better to have paused the game to check in (the Struijk one didn't look good as it happened?). That might've also brought the temperature down a bit for the last ten minutes or so where he genuinely seemed in danger of losing control.

I still play (a bit) and occasionally still get paid to referee reasonable level adult games here (i'd have my beady eye on Spaldy - I play in the equivalent othsl "Over the hill soccer league" system here and you'd be surprised how sneaky some of the old 'uns can be!), so I often end up watching the officials to see what their gamecraft is like. He was better than most.

[UbiqueLUFC33]

I thought he was doing okay up until the last ten minutes or so, when he started to let the game slip, possibly because of the reasons Spaldy outlined after your original post.

There were definitely a couple of times where players seemed to have taken more than a minor knock where I think he would've done better to have paused the gatme to check in (the Struijk one didn't look good as it happened?). That might've also brought the temperature down a bit for the last ten minutes or so where he genuinely seemed in danger of losing control.

He also seemed willing to let Martinez waste 6 of the available 8 minutes extra time to take his goal kicks.

[ozleeds]

So he was good till the last ten minutes. Players were falling over some legit and most pretend so I define anyone to be in the middle and adjudicate the right ones. He tries to keep games flawing but with so many players cheating in a system that's clearly broken.
Remember the rule where goalkeepers had a certain time to get rid of the ball? I wonder what genius took it out of the game and yes Martinez grabbing the ball and one minute later falling over pretending he was shot questions things.
Memory doesn't serve me well this day but the guy referred a game that might have been a championship game for us and all you guys were raving about what a good referre.

[norfolk white]

Villa's cheating, gamesmanship, call it what you like, has carried on from the Dean Smith, John Terry and Jack grealish era. Where villa slightly had the upper hand was courtinho, a class act, how we could do with someone like him.