Cheat-us USA
By Jay Hipps · July 6, 2008
If the only thing you knew about last night’s 1-0 Chivas USA win over the Earthquakes was gleaned from the match reports in the Mercury News, L.A. Times, or the L.A. Daily News, you’d think that the game was decided solely by a brilliant free kick by Ante Razov. There’s little mention of what led to the free kick in any of those stories, despite what will be recognized by any soccer fan as a controversial breach of the game’s unwritten rules of fair play.
If you missed it, here’s what a description of the situation from Jeff Carlisle’s match report here on CLS:
(T)he buildup to Razov’s strike will certainly offer plenty of grist for discussion. San Jose midfielder Ramiro Corrales was clearly laboring a good ten seconds with a leg injury before Chivas’ Atiba Harris collected the ball just outside his team’s attacking third. Corrales then raised his hand and went to the ground, but instead of playing the ball out of bounds, Harris embarked on a mazy run that took him around the prone Corrales and towards the San Jose goal. That is before an incensed Ronnie O’Brien upended Harris with a tackle that was an understandable as it was late.
Understandable because it was O’Brien himself who played the ball out of bounds in the 63rd minute when, with the Quakes in possession, Chivas midfielder Jesse Marsch went down injured. Marsch was eventually able to continue, unlike Corrales, who was substituted immediately after O’Brien committed his foul, one that earned the Irishman a yellow card for his brand of frontier justice.
So, let’s recap: not 15 minutes after allowing an injured opponent to get treatment by kicking the ball out of bounds, Ronnie O’Brien sticks up for a fallen teammate who is not shown the same courtesy, by knowingly committing a foul. His reward is a yellow card from the referee, a “thanks for the great opportunity — watch us try to score from here,” from Razov and the rest of Chivas USA, and no mention of his attempt at good sportsmanship from the assembled media. That’s just peachy, isn’t it?
Ah, but surely the soccer press is on the case, right? Uh, no. Luis Bueno, who covers the sport for ESPN and produces the excellent Sideline Views blog with Andrea Canales, said this in his match report for MLSnet.com:
Ronnie O’Brien fouled Harris in the 86th minute and picked up a yellow card. Two minutes later, Razov bent in the free kick from long distance, just past Cannon’s outstretched arms.
And, even though we just praised Sideline Views, Canales herself got it wrong on their running blog of the match. Here’s her two-sentence description of what happened in the 86th minute:
Yellow to O’Brien, who seems furious about something. (Grabavoy) replaces Corrales.
Furious about something? Yes, kind of like an ambulance driver might be a tad miffed for receiving a speeding ticket on the way to a rescue. Fortunately, Canales got it right in the match report she wrote for sjearthquakes.com:
The defense of the Quakes managed to turn aside a number of corners that Chivas USA earned, but it was a set piece that eventually undid them. It was a controversial sequence that started when Corrales crumpled to the ground with an apparent injury in the 87th minute.
Harris continued the Chivas USA attack, until O’Brien came in hard and late on a tackle, yelling at Harris immediately afterwards, upset that the unwritten code to put the ball out of play when someone is hurt had not been followed. O’Brien got a yellow card for the tackle and Chivas USA set up for a free kick.
We actually do have a broader point to make, aside from just ranting about the call (which does make us feel better, thanks for asking). When something like this happens, the media should be paying attention.
This is the sort of event that becomes part of the shared history of two teams. Mention Robert Warzycha’s handball for the Crew or Diego Serna’s wrestling takedown of then San Jose captain Jeff Agoos and Earthquakes fans will know immediately what you’re talking about, even though those events took place many years ago. The reward for that pair of evil-doers was a near-unanimous chorus of boos every time they touched the ball on subsequent visits to Spartan Stadium. If the media wants a gauge to measure how important a team is to its fans, these sort of incidents provide a great barometer. They need to be paying attention.
Given the media’s reputation for having an obsessive interest in controversy, you would think that they would do so, but that clearly was not the case last night. And they’ll all be wondering, the next time Chivas visits San Jose, why Razov is getting booed every time he touches the ball.
It’s almost cute where you chose to stop quoting Carlisle. If you had continued with his next paragraph, I suppose your rant wouldn’t appear so justified.
For the record he wrote: “Harris was far from the only guilty party however. San Jose was actually in possession when Corrales was initially injured and could have, and perhaps should have, played the ball out of bounds. But once the free kick was given, did Chivas opt to simply play the ball back to San Jose and admit to a simple misunderstanding? Apparently that kind of thinking escaped Razov, who showed no hesitation in depositing the ball over the wall and past Quakes goalkeeper Joe Cannon for the game’s only goal.”
It’s really Harris that deserves the boos…..and Preki, in addition to just Razov. Harris really isn’t much of a soccer player. His entire game is based on pretending he’s so clumsy that when he falls into people (because he couldn’t make a soccer tackle to save his life) that it was inadvertent and he didn’t mean to tackle them pointy ball style. He’s a cringe-worthy sorry excuse for a pretend player on many levels.
uh whatever, they found a way to win, we didn’t. it’s not the 1st time something like this has happened and won’t be the last. if we had forwards that knew what the hell to do w/ the ball it would be a moot question. also, why the hell are wer passing our midfield so often. route 1 football never gets you anywhere, it’s to easy to defend. specially when said forwards are horrible.
Harris continuing to play when Corrales went down is poor sportsmanship to be sure.
However, Kelly throwing a forearm in the first couple of minutes could have, maybe should have been a red card. Then in about the tenth minute, he committed another card worthy foul. If the ref had been on top of the game, Kelly would have been ejected and we’d have played ten on eleven for 75 or 80 minutes.
Also, still in the first half, we fouled one of their guys in the box and the GoatLovers should have been awarded a PK, but again we got lucky.
It stinks to lose so late in the match when we had been out playing them for the previous 20 minutes or more. But hey, we should have lost in the opening twenty minutes and Kelly ought to have a suspension for the red card.
We got lucky here. It should have been much worse.
Even so, Harris is a tool.
goooooo quaaaaaaakes!!!!
- Mark
It’s really pretty silly to suggest that Razov should be booed for dispatching a beautiful, unstoppable free kick. Harris, maybe, just maybe should be booed for continuing the run when in certain instances “gentlemen” might play the ball out. But if you recall at Euro 2008 the ref’s were making that decision.
Moreover, if “lee” is correct it is our fault for not kicking the ball out when Corrales went to ground.
A couple replies —
I’ve already deleted the game from my DVR, so this is from memory, but I believe that Corrales didn’t put his hand up until he realized he wasn’t going to be able to continue, which was after the Quakes lost the ball. Teams don’t kick the ball out every time a player gets up slowly; they wait for an indication that it’s necessary to do so. In this case, Corrales holding up his hand was that signal. Chivas either didn’t see or ignored that. Once they realized why O’Brien had fouled Harris, which should have been pretty obvious since Corrales required both medical attention and a sub, Chivas had every opportunity to right their wrong after play was stopped. Instead, Razov decided to go for goal.
I’m not suggesting that Razov should be booed — I’m just saying he will be, based on the response that Warzycha and Serna received in the past. As others have pointed out, Harris will likely be the target of fan derision as well.
And, of course, if Razov hadn’t scored on the play, this would all just be a minor footnote to what was a largely unwatchable game — which is why it’s not on my DVR anymore to begin with.
What I liked about the whole sequence was Ronnie O’Brien getting upset and getting in the face of the opposition, showing passion. Even if it was not the most well advised place to tackle someone.