What Day Is It?

 Frankly, it's all starting to run together at this point.  Yes on Union, yes on Newcastle, decent WWC quarter finals.  Messi is coming to Philly.  I should just leave it at that.  But I won't.

The Issue of Handling Raises Its Ugly Head

Two of the WWC quarterfinals were affected by handball calls.  One led me to question whether the wording of the law could be tightened up, the other showed the problems with interpreting the language as it currently reads.

Exhibit A for the prosecution is the handling call in 78th minute of Netherlands - Spain, which you can see here.  No disagreement that her arm is in an unnatural position.  But was she really trying to make herself bigger?  Me and Aly Wagner thought no, Dennis yes.  The law however doesn't require the referee to make the distinction.  It just says it's handling when a player "touches the ball with hand/arm when it has made their body unnaturally bigger."  Doesn't say "in an attempt to make the body bigger."  That made me wonder if maybe it should say that so we get back to the deliberate handball concept.  Except that would probably lead to more variability in handling calls.  One objective of the laws is to ensure that similar actions are penalized consistently.  My change would probably make it worse.  I'll withdraw the objection.

IFAB Handbook depicts proper arm
position when playing a back three

We are however still stuck with the issue of what is an unnatural position.  We present Exhibit A for the defense - the handling call against Japan in the 48th minute against Sweden, seen here.  I thought this was incredibly harsh.  She was jumping in attempt to play a ball that was deflected in close proximity. I have said this before, but unless we want all defenders to play like Raquel Welch dances, we need to recognize that the arms have to move when the body does.  It's bad enough watching defenders put their arms behind their backs to ensure that some overzealous official doesn't whistle them for handling.  Exactly how is that a natural position for anything?

Japan were hard done by that call but they lost for host of other reasons, including missing the (incredibly soft) PK that was called in their favor and generally not finding their game until way too late in the match.  

The other two quarterfinals were entertaining, and tense.  Australia and France played to a 0-0 draw through 120 minutes, then needed 10 rounds of PKs before the Matildas prevailed. A bit of keeper story lines there.  France tried to duplicate the 2014 Dutch team by substituting keepers, presumably because Durand was better at PKs than Peyraud Magnin at stopping PKs; Durand did save two of 10, with a third hitting the post.  The one that hit the post?  That was Australia's keeper Mackenzie Arnold.  No worries as she earned her keep (so to speak) with three saves in the shootout.  Dennis asks what's the fascination with keepers taking PKs?  Just a rare bird I guess; you don't see it that often.

Colombia once again killed any rooting interest for me with their "physical" play so I was more than happy to see England advance 2-1.  How is it possible that Ekaterina Koroleva only whistled Colombia for eight fouls and no yellows?  

And You May Tell Yourself This Is Not My Beautiful Game (apologies to the Talking Heads)

I was not expecting a pretty game Friday night when the Union took on Queretaro.  I was not disappointed.  Things got off to a great start when the lights went out minutes before the scheduled start of the match.  Power was restored in about 20 minutes but the start was delayed for almost 75 minutes as the players needed to warm up again. 

Jesus saves us again
Photo:Eric Hartline-USA TODAY Sports

When they did get going, the U played some wonderful attacking football for the first 10+ minutes and the goal from Bueno was fully deserved, if a touch sloppy.  Not long after that, the U clearly kicked the ball out to allow for an injured player to be treated.  Queretaro, in one of the most shithouseriest breaches of protocol, did not throw it back to the Union when play restarted.  Things were pretty much awful from there on out.   There was an immediate scuffle over that incident but the shithousery tone was set - pushing, delaying, overacting, all of it.  A player who had already been ejected with his second yellow mockingly waving to the referee as he slowly departed the pitch.  The entire Queretaro bench swarming Harriel as the final whistle blew.   

Wait, the worst part was that not only couldn't the Union put this team away, the visitors leveled things in the 65th minute.  As play dragged on into 10 minutes of stoppage time (shithousery takes time), the threat of this match going to PKs became very real.  Fortunately in that last minute of stoppage time, Torres played a good ball ahead to Wagner, who sent a cross right onto the feet of Donovan which he buried for the game winner.  An easy call for this week's YouTubeableMoment.  We did have a scary moment waiting out the VAR review of offside; close but Donovan was on.  As Jeff H would say, bring on Miamessi.

Meanwhile, Across the Pond...

This cheeky chip from Isak made it 3-1

Newcastle had pretty close to a dream start.  Unfortunately for Dennis, that means Aston Villa's opening was a bit of a nightmare.  The 5-1 final isn't an accurate reflection of how the game played out.  With the score 2-1 at the half, the studio people were talking about what a great match it was, totally entertaining.  Even when Esock's second made it 3-1 at 58 minutes, the game didn't feel out of reach.  Then Newcastle made subs (Wilson and Barnes) and just kept going while Villa looked slow and tired.  The Magpies could have actually added more than the two they did.  Expected goals (according to Understat.com, the new official source for BFS xG numbers) were 4.32 - 1.49.  So the final isn't misleading in that way, just that it was competitive for 70 or so minutes before things fell apart for Villa.

New acquisition Sandro Tonali displayed an excellent work rate and contributed more to the offense than I expected; in fact he score the first goal a mere six minutes in.  Totally unexpected performance on the left wing from Anthony Gordon, who beat Matty Cash fairly regularly.  And when Harvey Barnes came in at 68 minutes, Cash's bad awful day got even worse.  Esock got a brace and just missed out on a hat trick.  The glass is 1/8th empty view is that the defense was cut open a few times and they were lucky not to have given up at least two.  

On the Villa side, at least Diaby looked like a quality addition, especially with Buendia gone for 6-8 months after a knee injury in practice.  Tyrone Mings went down in the first half with what is likely a season ending knee injury as well.  Pau Torres was probably going to eventually take his position anyway but with a European campaign to manage as well as an EPL season, they'll need somebody.  

Saw a few other matches.  Man City looked workmanlike in beating Burnley 3-0.  With two goals, Haaland is on pace to score 76.  Brentford were tough at home and held Spurs to a 2-2 draw.  That would be the Kaneless Spurs, who finally completed a transaction to sell Harry to Bayern Munich for £120 million. And Chelsea - Liverpool drew for the 20th 7th straight time.  Interesting to watch Mo Salah exit the pitch in the 77th, pulling off pieces of tape, littering the field and vacillating between pouting and being angry; Klopp has so far brushed it off.  His pass (Salah not Klopp) to Luis Diaz for the Liverpool goal - seen here - was awesome.

Haven't looked at highlights from other matches but Everton can't be happy with an 0-1 loss at Goodison Park to Fulham.  Brighton "welcomed" Luton to the top tier with a 4-1 thumping.  

Just Pay the Damn Utility Bill

First we had the lights go out at Subaru Park on Friday.  On Sunday, the start of the Brentford - Spurs match was delayed for seven minutes because there was no water coming into the stadium.  Play was allowed to commence once the Brentford CFO convinced the water company that the check was in the mail.  

Conversation That Could Have Taken Place and Did

Dennis: Did you say Chelsea are pouring it on in the second half?

Steve: No, I said they were now playing with Gusto

Maybe They Were Listening

Check out this list of new directives to EPL referees from Howard Webb.  Wow, this is close to a laundry list of items we've complained about here.  And they do appear to be serious about this.  I  got to see "only" four EPL matches this weekend but saw two yellows for waving the imaginary yellow card, one for kicking the ball away and one for a keeper delaying the taking of a PK.  Still waiting for one for swarming the referee but so far so good.  We are thrilled.

Burnley Fans

At the referee's whistle to start the match, the players took a knee, continuing the practice to protest racism.  A section of fans booed, though others did cheer. Then, early in the match, someone threw a lighter and hit Rico Lewis.  Recall that  three years ago, Burnley fans were responsible for a "white lives matter" banner flown over The Etihad, as detailed here.  Fortunately, Burnley management has taken these issues seriously.  So, for the moment, we will not put them in the category with Leeds, a side we actively root against.  In Leeds' case, management is a part of the problem.

Slowing Down

These mutli-post weeks are draining.  Increases my appreciation for people who have daily columns to put out.  The volume of matches is slowing and this is probably the last multi-post week for awhile.

We have mid-week semi-final action for the WWC and the Leagues Cup.  Spain and Sweden kick off at 4 pm on Tuesday while Australia and England start at 6 am on Wednesday.  Our preferences are Sweden and Australia.  Dennis notes that we will have a first-time winner this year.

For the Leagues Cup we have the Union - Inter Miami at 7 on Tuesday and Monterrey - Nashville at 9:30.  I am happy to report that I will be in attendance at Subaru Park.   The Leagues Cup matches have seen less than full capacity thus far but somehow I don't think that will be the case Tuesday.  The Union will have to play better than any of their recent outings if they want to make it to the finals.  Note that regardless of the outcome, they will play again Saturday.  Third place in the Leagues Cup doesn't sound all that great except you get a spot in CONCACAF Champions League.  Given the U's MLS season, it's not clear they were going to get a berth through that route.

We'll be back Friday to look at the finals and to review the EPL schedule.