LOUD AND CLEAR
There has been no dearth of refereeing howlers in Brazil
TICOS DENIED TWICE
Costa Rica, 1-0, should have had a crack at going 2-0 up. Greece’s Vasilis Torosidis handled the ball in the area, but neither the referee nor his assistant spotted it. Soon, Greece equalised, and Los Ticos were lucky to scrape through on penalties. It wasn’t the first time they were denied, though. Against Italy in the group stage, Joel Campbell was brought down by Giorgio Chiellini, but again, no spot kick.
NO BITE, ONLY MARKS
Mexican referee Marco Rodriquez sent off Claudio Marchisio to reduce Italy to 10-men, but didn’t spot Uruguay’s Luis Suarez sink his incisors into Giorgio
Chiellini. The winner came soon after as the distracted Italians crashed out.
EL TRI OUTRAGED
Rafael Marquez stuck out his foot, Arjen Robben tripped and fell? No, it was a dive, felt the eliminated Mexicans. “In three of the four games, the refereeing has been disastrous”, said coach Miguel Herrera (pic, left), also referring to Colombian linesman Humberto Clavijo incorrectly flagging Giovani dos Santos offside twice against Cameroon, and two penalties.
EL-BLOWS
Elbow in the face? No problem, Yuichi Nishimura and Noumandiez
Doue (in red) seem to say. While the Japanese referee didn’t send off Neymar in Brazil’s opener against Croatia, the Ivorian failed to spot Frenchmen Mamadou Sakho and Oliver Giroud’s elbows to the faces of their Ecuadorian opponents.
‘GO HOME, REF’
That’s Herrera to Pedro Proenca, the Portuguese referee who was in charge of the Round of 16 match against Netherlands. Also, Edin Dzeko to New Zealander Peter O’Leary after the Bosnian’s goal against Nigeria was wrongly ruled out for offside, a decision that led to the Cup debutants’ ouster.
BIG GUNS MATTER
A second-half moment broke Iran’s back after Pablo Zabaleta brought down Ashkan Dejagah in the box and the Serbian referee Milorad Mazic rejected appeals for a penalty. Leo then scored an injury time winner.
THE BIG STAGE
Holders Spain got an early lead in their 1-5 rout by Netherlands only because Italian referee Nicola Rizzoli awarded a dubious penalty, after Diego Costa caught the trailing leg of Stefan de Vrij and went down. Later, with scores tied 1-1 and Greece needing to beat Cote d’Ivoire, Georgios
Samaras (pic) tripped on his own foot and fell. Ecuador referee Carlos Vera gave the penalty, Samaras scored, Greece qualified.