I went to the game and the worst performance was not from any players but the referee. It wasn't that he was biased just completely incompetent! How did he disallow our second goal in the first half. I think there goalie dived!, Also some of the free kicks he gave and didn't give on both sides was laughable. Clattenberg for me I give you 3 out of 10
Agree with you on the disallowed goal, having seen that again it was the wrong decision. I think he just guessed. But if anything he was biased in our favour. Schneiderlin and Yoshida were both lucky not to get second yellows today. By the letter of the law, both should have been sent off. In fact, Yoshida's challenge which was let go led directly to our equaliser. Martin Jol was unhappy with him and I can see why to be honest.
Watched it on Live iPlayer, so was able to go back and look at it again. It looked like a legitimate foul from the initial view, but from subsequent ones, Puncheon sticks his bum out slightly and Schwarzer goes down as if he has been speared by a stiletto [no sniggering back there, I'm not writing it out again]. So, on the one hand it appears a foul and on other it appears we were robbed of a perfectly good goal. A keeper who is a diver. Now that's an interesting idea.
If you read my original post I clearly said he wasn't biased but incompetent! So I wasn't saying he was favouring us or Fulham, but that he was just making inept decisions against Fulham and us
Fulham should have conceded at least twice as many free kicks today. At least 3 instances where he had to book the Fulham player as he'd booked ours for fouling players in less advanced areas. He was inconsistent with that. Several times our players were shoved to ground or in back and nothing yet blows up immediately when we score a goal doing something he's let Fulham do all game. Our goal count easily have counted so Jol's point is largely irrelevant as they'd have been dead and buried at 2-0. The decisions at best evened themselves out and Jol is in dreamland if he thinks his team were hard done by today especially having scored two deflected goals, one being an own goal. Personally I thought he had a poor game. I'm not buying Morgan should have been sent off. First card the ball went out of play, the player is going no where so I thought that was harsh anyway. Couple of times Fulham fouled us similar to his second tackle and the ref didn't card the player so you can't have it both ways.
Wow. I thought the ref was ok today. Yes, their were some decisions he missed. I think he got the "goal" decision correct. We could have seen two reds today, but sensible ref decided against that. Refs will always miss decisions as they see it once, in real time and from pitch level. I sit in the stands from on high and I'm brilliant at reffing as many sat around me. If we really look back at this game, I believe we should be able to see that the referee was okay today.
Agree on the cards. Thought Morgan was a cert to go. Must admit I thought Punch blocked off the keeper and that was never going to be allowed. A couple of dodgy decisoions but what game doesn't have a few of those?
Ref allowed duff to dive a couple of times the one with Adam where they ended up with free kick outside the area was very poor decision making indeed
Hoovers hand ball yellow was farcical, he had no idea where the ball was going and no deliberate attempt was made to block the ball, it hit him, the lino on the Kingsland was quick to flag, but looked puzzled at the booking, pity he wasn't as quick on three missed offside calls when had not kept up with play, and on one throw-in Fulham gained 25 yards as was picked up on the Sky coverage. Clattenburg is a renowned autograph hunter and normally would have doubled his collection, I suspect he didn't send Spider off for that second offence because he realised that he had got the first one wrong. Yes, our second goal did come after the officials missed a foul by Yoshida, so I guess that evened things out a tad. I also think that after the yellow card Hoover was a wee bit less aggressive than normal, we couldn't risk another red card, that would have been terminal.
I'd forgotten the hand ball. Clearly accidental and yes that must have made him nervous. Bet he will be glad to put that game behind him!
Looking at the Punch "goal", from different TV angles in one it looked a ded cert foul, from another angle the impression was completely different, the Referee on this one probably had to give the GK the benefit of the doubt although it was a bit theatrical. There was next to no protest from our lads, whether that is down to good discipline or lack of conviction you can only conjecture.
Amazed people think Morgan's yellow shouldn't have been one. It was a very badly mistimed tackle, always going to get a yellow card for that.
We lament referees if they get decisions wrong, where is the sort of praise they should get when they get decisions right? It takes a stronger man than I to become a referee, and then you have 30,000 people chanting about you in a derogatory manner, cut them some slack, looking at replays after the game is all well and good, but these guys make their decisions in a split second, and can only give what they see.
If I was refereeing he'd have been sent off for two yellows but that's besides the point. My point was that considering what the ref didn't book Fulham players for he didn't deserve two yellows at all
Agree with you all, ref had a shocker! Missed the shocking tackle on JRod by Sidwell, booked just about every offence by a Saint, by his own standards he should have sent Snidders off in the second half, disallowed a perfectly good goal out for Saints from the corner. Apart from that he was GREAT!
