The very lax refereeing during the World Cup starts from a good intention, but exposes to a problematic backtracking.
The World Cup had several surprises in store for refereeing: the “semi-automatic offside”, which caused us to go from a centimeter measure to a no less absurd millimeter measure; extra-large extra time, leading to establish a kind of money time, without solving the overall game time management problem.
The most determining development was however the instruction (again issued without publicity) of a very striking “let play”, which resulted in a low number of red cards (4), very noticeable in terms of the gestures that could have been worth deportation.
The number of fouls called rose from 27.1 per game in Russia to 24.2 in Qatar, and some rough teams, such as Argentina and Morocco, were significantly spared. Argentina-Netherlands, despite 17 yellows (second total in the history of the competition), did not experience any exclusion.
photo fifa.com
PLAYERS AND REFEREES: WHO ARE THE TOUGHEST?
The history of the number of yellow and red cards since their adoption in the 1970 World Cup [1] however, delivers counter-intuitive lessons, the 2018 edition having recorded the same number of the first (4), and an equivalent number of the seconds (219 against 222).
In this case, the figures are not necessarily more indicative than the feelings. They depend on two interdependent variables whose shares they do not reveal: the behavior of the players and that of the referees. A high number of sanctions can reflect either the harshness of some or the severity of others.
The leap recorded during the Italian World, particularly marked by acts of anti-game and brutality, comes under the first explanation. The post-1990 rise logically results from the tightening of the rules and their application.
Conversely, the decline observed after a record 2006 vintage is probably explained by a desire to let the game continue. This is, at the very least, the case for 2022.
Another indicator, the number of penalties awarded is down significantly compared to 2018 (23 against 29), but remains very high: second “gross” total in history, third reported per match.
We could welcome the (slightly) lower number of VAR-penalties (for micro-faults or unintentional hands), but the non-interventions or non-sanctions on the part of the video referees exacerbated the frustrations.
THE RISKS OF LAXISM
This permissive policy is encouraged by the consensual idea that overly interventionist referees contribute to chopping up the game and harming it. [2]. But this simplistic position has its downside, observed in Qatar: lax referees end up encouraging acts of anti-play and brutality… which chop up the game and harm it.
It undoubtedly favored the Argentinians who were not afraid to resort to interventions beyond the ordinary limit (including an elbow in the plexus of Hugo Lloris from the start of the final), and various special effects or provocations committed with a certain art.
We can defend this football, that of the 1970s and 1980s, choose the first term of the opposition between “contact sport” and “avoidance sport”, prefer vice, which is indeed part of football, to virtue, choose not to particularly “protect artists”.
We can also consider that the turning point taken in the 1990s was (really) salutary and that the change observed during this World Cup is worrying. It opens the door to a return to both small faults that spoil the game and large ones that threaten the physical integrity of the players.
This permissiveness has also encouraged the usual controversies and misunderstandings about sanctions and non-sanctions in similar situations, feelings multiplied when it is the VAR which intervenes or does not intervene.
Unlike 2018, where controversies (excluding VAR) had been limited, and the work of the referees praised, 2022 leaves a more deleterious impression. Several teams have claimed to be wronged, like the appeals filed by Morocco and France, a symptom of the judicialization of arbitration and aspirations for an impossible “justice”.
A DELICATE BALANCE
The subject underlines the ineptitude of the binary conceptions of arbitration, and the contradictory injunctions made to the referees, who should let play but “hold” their match, be “psychologists” but uniformly apply the rules in the name of “harmonization” chimerical.
They should not behave like “little bosses” when they suffer constant, childish and unjustified protests. During the tournament (but was this even noticed?), the slightest touch was claimed, the most indisputable faults contested.
By the way, the many broken promises of the VAR can make you smile bitterly today: “There will be no more controversy, “There will be no more disputes”, “This will help the referees”, “The big teams will no longer be advantaged”etc.
Obviously, by dint of malevolence and demagoguery, to make the referee bear the responsibility for the final result, for all the incidents and for all the matches which degenerate [3]by exonerating players and benches whose behavior would be intolerable in all other sports, we end up completely obscuring the discussion.
One can only seek the best possible arbitration, which always proceeds from a delicate balance between opposing imperatives, which obliges to interpret ambivalent situations and to be resolved by taking decisions that are inherently questionable – but not erroneous for all that.
This fairly turbulent World Cup in terms of discipline invites in any case to measure the will to let play, in order to avoid an unfortunate return to a situation in which neither the players nor the spectacle were protected.
[1] Disclaimers and disclaimers existed before, but were not materialized.
[2] It is an accusation ritually made against French referees who, a few years ago, did not particularly stand out in this area. She returned this season with a record of red cards that raised no questions about the attitude of the players.
[3] We had studied, last year, a textbook case of the demolition of referees.