>>>I have also questioned the referee's call but would not for one instant consider it knee-jerk or unconsidered. If he had it in his mind to nefariously nudge Italy into the next round, he surely would have done it a more subtle way than a PK call in the 94th minute. He had to make the call right away. You can't wait -- wait even two seconds and play has moved on and it's too late. I'm sure he made the call the way he saw it.
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>>>That said, instant replay in the World Cup might not be a bad idea. It's contrary to the essential value of continuous play, and I'm sure fans around the world would scornfully count out the seconds of review time, but ultimately you want the call to be right.
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>>>I don't know if instant replay would have done any good yesterday. I watched it at least five times and still don't know whether it was a trip or a dive.
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>>The view from the once-every-four-years-fan........
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>>I don't know all the rules on what constitutes a foul and I sure don't know how to detect a dive but....
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>>I've seen roughing the passer calls where the defender had less time to react than the Italian had to hurdle the Aussie.
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>It was a bang-bang play. I don't think that's in dispute at all. My only point was I think the referee made the best call he could in the instant he had to make it. I don't think there was any fix.

Maybe I'm prejudiced because I didn't see it live and knew what was about to happen. My bang-bang reaction (seeing it first at full speed) was that it was an awful call. After seeing the replays, I still think it was a bad call. I will grant that the ref may not have had the same view I did because of his position on the field.

I should add that I usually tend to be on the ref's side in these kinds of plays. I officiated high school and college volleyball for several years and know all about "gotta make the call NOW" and getting it wrong. The worst match I ever called was also the highest level match. High school sectional finals - I was first choice of both coaches - and had either a bad day or collapsed under the pressure.

I didn't mean to imply there was a fix. It's almost impossible to avoid reacting differently to certain players and/or teams (think of the Jordan rules), but ruling in favor of a team because that's the one the "powers that be" want to advance seems like too big a stretch to me.