We Are Entertained

Sixteen matches played.  One quarter of the tournament is in the books.  A little overwhelmed here at BFS so we'll revert to our old standby - lots of random observations.

Gareth Bane Bale Again

Not him again

Twice this month the Welshman has messed with this soccer fan's rooting interest.  Less than three weeks ago he was scoring the tying goal late in stoppage time to foil the Union's hopes of winning the MLS Cup.  On Monday, there he was again, drawing a foul in the box and converting the subsequent PK to help Wales grab a draw with the US.  To be honest, a draw probably was a fair result here.  Don't be fooled by the US possession advantage of 59/41.  Shots were 4/3 and shots on target were 1/3.  Expected goals was 1.05 -1.28; the PK is worth .79 so xG from open play was 1.05 - .49.  

The US did move the ball well in the first half and generated a couple of good scoring chances.  But a lot of the possession was wasted on crosses that were blocked or intercepted; Dennis notes we are not exactly the tallest team up front.  The goal was awesome link up play between Sargent, Pulisic and Weah.  Check out Pulisic's through ball on this week's YouTubeableMoment.  Unfortunately they needed more moments like that; they played okay, but certainly not great.  

The gnashing of teeth that the US didn't get the win is likely because we had the lead.  Looking at 538, the US chances of making it out of the group stage did fall a little, from 53 to 45.  Yes, life would be easier if they had won.  But they were only slight favorites going in.  For me the key here was to not lose this match to keep the other matches meaningful.  Was there a scenario that got them through that didn't involve beating Iran?  I'll admit that the bad news here is that the draw with Wales means they could get tripped up by the various tiebreakers.  That is, we could both lose to England and both beat Iran, which would mean advancement would come down to goal differentials.

Broken Promises

This has been a World Cup of controversy.  Plenty of issues to discuss.  I'm not interested in defending Qatar for a host of bad things they've done.  But there is a bit of throwing stones by people who live in glass houses.  Seems like a significant portion of the US population would be more than happy to impose Qatari-like prohibitions on the LGBTQ population here.  France bans the full Islamic veil in public places.  Not saying we shouldn't press Qatar but maybe save some of the outrage to make things better on the home front.

Supreme Committee Chairman?

That said, FIFA is caving in with regularity to the Qatar Supreme Committee for Legacy and Delivery, the organization responsible for World Cup preparations.  After more than a decade of promises that alcohol would be available in the stadiums, there was a last minute reversal on that.  Infantino (FIFA head) offered a defense along the lines of you can't drink beer at your seat in England (true, but you can drink it in the concourses) and maybe going three hours without beer at your seat isn't awful.  He of course misses the point that it's not either of those things but reneging on agreements that were presumably part of why Qatar was allowed to host the event in the first place.  Same for allowing Jews to pray in public and threatening to issue yellow cards to players wearing rainbow armbands.

For the record, there has been drinking during the matches here at 6911.  I had pictures to post but some guy from FIFA confiscated my phone.

DVR Alert

One of the directives from FIFA to referees for this tournament was for them to be sticklers about stoppage time to make sure we're getting a full 90 minutes of soccer.  This has led to some big numbers, often exceeding five minutes in the second half.  There were a few telecasts that went over two hours.  So, if you are DVRing this stuff, remember to add at least 15 minutes to the ending time for group stage matches.  When we get to the knockout phase, 90 minutes may be the recommended dosage.

I would be thrilled to see the FA include a similar instruction for EPL matches.  I suspect the numbers would be even larger than we're seeing at the World Cup because there's more shithousery.  It would be good for people to see just how much time wasting is really going on.

Data.  We Want More Data

We are seeing a new possession stat that includes "in contest" as a third option.  Courtesy of The Athletic, here's what "in contest" includes:  

Firstly and pretty obviously, when two players are competing for the ball, whether in the air or on the ground, that is considered in-contest.

Secondly, when a defender clears a ball from its intended target. It will not be considered in possession of either team until it has been retrieved by the opposing defence or by an attacker.

Similarly, if a defender makes a block or interception but is not in total control of the ball, it will be considered in-contest.

A goalkeeper parrying the ball away from goal when making a save will also be considered in-contest until it is recovered by either of the teams, at which point a player will have to make a second touch, a pass or any other ‘in-control’ action for the ball to be considered in the possession of their team.

Maybe after the group stage, when we have 48 games to work with, I'll see what the differences are between the two metrics.

Second, the World Cup sees the introduction of the most technologically advanced ball ever.  Details are here.  In short, we could be looking at an explosion in the data available to analyze the game.

Biggest Upset

So you didn't get up at 5 am to see Argentina - Saudi Arabia, thinking you'd see the score when you got up and realize you didn't miss anything.  Wrong offside trap breath.  The Saudis kept an incredibly disciplined back line that led to Argentina being flagged for offsides 10 times, including three that chalked off goals at 22, 28 and 34 minutes.  The Saudis grabbed two early second half goals and held on for an incredible 2-1 upset.  

Martinez offside by inches

Some of the offside calls were incredibly tight.  The semi-automated technology that is now in use provides pretty cool pictures.  Check out the picture (left) on the Martinez call at 34 minutes.  I found the picture for the disallowed goal at 22 minutes and that one was very clear.  I can't find the shot for the call at 28 minutes.  Whoops, and there's some controversy about that one.  There's a story and a picture making the rounds that purport to show that the technology looked at the wrong defender.  This article includes the point I want to make.  You can see the lines drawn on the two different defenders and you can see the VAR picture.  The initial conclusion would be that maybe this wasn't offside.  Here's the problem though.  The VAR picture they show is the play at 34 minutes, not 28 minutes.  Maybe there was a mistake here but until I see the VAR picture from the call at 28 minutes, I'm skeptical that this was a huge error. 

You Can Lead a Ref to VAR But You Can't Make Him Use It

Before delving into the controversial calls in the Belgium Canada match, recall that the BFS's first rule of officiating is that the referee never costs you a match.  If you look carefully, you'll find enough failures of your own that explain the result.  No doubt Canada feel hard done by two calls in the 0-1 loss.  But they missed the PK that was called, took 22 shots but only three were on target and had expected goals of 2.45.  Sounds like somebody needs finishing school.

Of course, that doesn't mean there weren't refereeing mistakes.  We'll take the "easier" one first. At 38 minutes, Laren fell under pressure from Witsel.  I could not find a good video of the incident.  Notably, the Fox highlights package doesn't include either of the calls.  Real time I didn't think it was a foul.  That opinion held through the first look on replay - it didn't look like a push to me.  But then I did notice that Witsel might have actually tripped Laryea.  Hard to say for sure.  Sikazwe didn't call it, and VAR did not instruct him to take another look.  Sounds like proper procedure was followed; that this was not a clear and obvious error does not seem like, well, a clear and obvious error.  Finding some measure of support for that view on the web.

The second incident has more moving parts and some possible procedural issues.  At 13 minutes, Buchanan received the ball in an offside position.  The AR raised the flag but before Sikazwe blew his whistle, Vertonghen nicked the ball away and  caught Buchanan on the foot as he landed.   You can see the play here. That there was at least one error here is clear - Buchanan received the ball on a back pass from Hazard, not from a teammate.  Therefore, there can be no offside infraction.  What transpires from there is not clear.  Did the VAR crew believe that the whistle was blown before the foul?  If yes, then they would think that VAR cannot intervene.  Problem is that video/audio shows the whistle came afterward.  A second possibility is that they reviewed it and concluded the offside call was correct.  That seems impossible.  The third possibility is that they reviewed it and concluded that not calling a foul on Vertonghen was not a clear and obvious error.  Possible but the video leaves little doubt that Vertonghen tripped Buchanan.  I went back to the DVR to see that the restart was a free kick for Belgium.  But Sikawze did not have his arm in the air signifying an indirect free kick, which is the proper restart after an offside call.  Probably just another error in this whole sequence.  I still think option one is what played out.  In short, a clusterf big screw up that hasn't really been cleared up as of Thursday night.

Uh, Maybe Use a Different Metaphor

Nice hair

As Hannibal Mejbri came on for Tunisia, the Fox announcer said he's the kind of player who wears his heart on his sleeve.  Dennis suggested that with the name Hannibal, that was probably an inappropriate metaphor.  Also, Hannibal is an early contender for Best Hair of the Tournament.

Job Security

Ferran Torres of Spain is dating Sira Martinez, daughter of Spanish manager Luis Enrique. 

Other Random Stuff

- Sure Argentina lost and Germany fell 1-2 to Japan.  Many of other favorites cruised, with England besting Iran 6-2, France beating Australia 4-1, Spain pasting Costa Rica 7-0 and Brazil eventually taking care of Serbia 2-0.

- Very happy to see Olivier Giroud score two for France, tying him with Thierry Henry for most goals scored for France; check out this article in The Athletic asking why is he still underappreciated

- Four 0-0 draws so far but they were still entertaining

- Though the BFS Match 1 recommendations were decent matches, you might have done better with other choices.  The US-Wales contest was good and I'll stand by the Uruguay - South Korea choice (fierce like a derby) but Argentina - Saudi Arabia was clearly your best choice for Tuesday and Germany-Japan for Wednesday

Shameless Cross Promotion

In my second job, moonlighting for FanHubTF, I did this piece on the similarities between false starts and offside.

Something to be Thankful For

Newcastle announced that they are not interested in signing Ronaldo, who's contract with Man United was mutually terminated this week.  There had been some articles linking him with Newcastle and I was getting nervous we would do something stupid.  As Dennis put it, "let's take a 3rd place team that has no problem scoring even with two of it's best attackers out injured and has great chemistry, and introduce an aging spectacle who will destroy the locker room."  What he said. 

Group Stage Match 2 Picks

Friday - England US at 2 pm

Saturday - Argentina Mexico at 2 pm

Sunday - Spain Germany at 2 pm

Monday - Portugal Uruguay at 2 pm

It's mere coincidence they are all at 2 pm.  I might have recommended France - Denmark on Friday but Germany's loss to Japan means that the Spain-Germany match isn't merely about who will be 1-2 in group.  Same for Croatia -Canada on Saturday; Argentina's loss makes the match with Mexico more interesting

I was going to do Match 3 recommendations but that's really hard to do without knowing the Match 2 results.  Hoping I can do at least a short post for Tuesday morning to discuss scenarios for advancement to the knockout rounds.