The Ref

[Wooders]

Won it for them - Suarez should have walked and missed the next game

[branny]

I can understand most of his decisions. The handball for one wasn't blatantly obvious until they showed replays. The two that have and still baffle me are the Dzeko penalty not given, which was even obvious in real time and the lack of a second yellow for Suarez. Benefit of the doubt for the first when MDM left his leg out for Suarez to fall over but the one in the box when Kompany put his hand on him was ridiculous. If that's not simulation I don't know what is.

I'm also hoping there'll be a bit of karma with Skrtl as well before the end of the season. Surely the refs are aware of his shirt pulling by now.

I'm not blaming the ref. If we don't win the league nobody's fault but our own.

[Hazy2]

Well said. There is always a holier than thou element that waltz in every time a ref fucks a game up, saying it shouldn't matter.

The ref didn't fuck the game up. Period.

Dowd or Webb will get the Chelsea game , Jose and his selected players will make sure they are clear with everyone, they are not having a HOMER, Clatenburg was a homer in the biggest game of the season. City are just to nice to be honest, we lack the devil meant needed to say fuck this as it happens, good side soft touch.

[blue wine]

as a ref myself, i can say he had a bad game. in the buildup to the first goal there was a clear foul on clichy. suarez backed in to clichy, the ref gave advantage for suarez. suarez played the man and not the ball.

[Foreverinbluedreams]

I can understand most of his decisions. The handball for one wasn't blatantly obvious until they showed replays. The two that have and still baffle me are the Dzeko penalty not given, which was even obvious in real time and the lack of a second yellow for Suarez. Benefit of the doubt for the first when MDM left his leg out for Suarez to fall over but the one in the box when Kompany put his hand on him was ridiculous. If that's not simulation I don't know what is.

I'm also hoping there'll be a bit of karma with Skrtl as well before the end of the season. Surely the refs are aware of his shirt pulling by now.

I'm not blaming the ref. If we don't win the league nobody's fault but our own.

Benefit of the doubt? Nah mate a complete and utter bottle job, Demichelis didn't leave his leg out he slid by Suarez completely missing him and the ball then Suarez kicked Demi's trailing foot and threw himself. I still vividly recall Bellamy getting sent by Clattenburg for simulation against Bolton even though he was fouled. The one with Vinnie, again not enough contact to go down the way he did but ( tin hat on ) I have to give credit to Clattenburg on that one as a weaker ref would've pointed to the spot.

As for random bad decisions throughout the game, Garcia's yellow - what the fuck was that about? He came in from the side and won the ball, not even a foul nevermind a yellow. Ferna's yellow - a body check at the corner flag in your own half is worthy of a yellow? Since when? I wouldn't mind but some of Liverpool's shielding of the ball to see it over the line was a hell of a lot worse than what Ferna did.

I agree with Blue Wine on the foul on Clichy by Suarez, wtf was Clattenburg waving advantage for? but the one that really made me laugh was in the first half, City corner, ball breaks out to the edge of the area and Silva jumps to head it, Suarez makes no attempt to play the ball instead backs into Silva whilst jumping, Clattenburg? free kick to Suarez.

All that said I don't like to pin blame for the defeat on the ref, it's definitely a factor but when we direct all of our ire at the ref we tend to overlook our own deficiencies ( I'm not saying that's what anyone is doing, it's just a general statement ).

[Wonderwall]

Here is an article to Graham Polls view on clattenburgs performance.

The headline reads SUPERB CLATTENBURG, but then goes on to dissect all his poor decisions to prove he was anything but.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/footba ... wrong.html

[Tokyo Blue]

Benefit of the doubt? Nah mate a complete and utter bottle job, Demichelis didn't leave his leg out he slid by Suarez completely missing him and the ball then Suarez kicked Demi's trailing foot and threw himself. I still vividly recall Bellamy getting sent by Clattenburg for simulation against Bolton even though he was fouled. The one with Vinnie, again not enough contact to go down the way he did but ( tin hat on ) I have to give credit to Clattenburg on that one as a weaker ref would've pointed to the spot.

As for random bad decisions throughout the game, Garcia's yellow - what the fuck was that about? He came in from the side and won the ball, not even a foul nevermind a yellow. Ferna's yellow - a body check at the corner flag in your own half is worthy of a yellow? Since when? I wouldn't mind but some of Liverpool's shielding of the ball to see it over the line was a hell of a lot worse than what Ferna did.

I agree with Blue Wine on the foul on Clichy by Suarez, wtf was Clattenburg waving advantage for? but the one that really made me laugh was in the first half, City corner, ball breaks out to the edge of the area and Silva jumps to head it, Suarez makes no attempt to play the ball instead backs into Silva whilst jumping, Clattenburg? free kick to Suarez.

All that said I don't like to pin blame for the defeat on the ref, it's definitely a factor but when we direct all of our ire at the ref we tend to overlook our own deficiencies ( I'm not saying that's what anyone is doing, it's just a general statement ).

Very good post. I would like to add that we haven't actually got that many deficiencies, which is why I think certain things happen when we play.

[Ted Hughes]

as a ref myself, i can say he had a bad game. in the buildup to the first goal there was a clear foul on clichy. suarez backed in to clichy, the ref gave advantage for suarez. suarez played the man and not the ball.

He also gave several 50/50 decisions in our favour during the game which I have often seen go against us. Not his fault that VK defended the situation like a twat & Clichy was too easily muscled off the ball rather than fight for it.

I am no defender of refs & am a confirmed Clattenburg hater, but imo, he got two decisions wrong; the handball & not sending off Suarez.

The 'pens' were all dives by City players, just the same way as Suarez dived twice for Liverpool. All involved contact. All involved players who were actively looking to win penalties rather than play football. He chose not to give any & that was 100% correct imo. I wish all refs looked upon those kind of incidents the same way. Clattenburg himself has been conned by similar efforts on many occasions though; perhaps he has got wise to it, but I doubt it. He probably realised Liverpool were going to try & use him to win the game, so decided he would only give real 'nailed on' pens, to either side. Fair play to him. I think he should have booked Zabba for a quite pathetic dive late in the game but let him off as he did Suarez, so can't even argue there really.

City lost the game due to poor team selection & tactics from the manager plus weak defending & some iffy finishing.

Clattenburg imo, did his job better than some City players, & Pellegrini, did theirs.

[Hazy2]

as a ref myself, i can say he had a bad game. in the buildup to the first goal there was a clear foul on clichy. suarez backed in to clichy, the ref gave advantage for suarez. suarez played the man and not the ball.

He also gave several 50/50 decisions in our favour during the game which I have often seen go against us. Not his fault that VK defended the situation like a twat & Clichy was too easily muscled off the ball rather than fight for it.

I am no defender of refs & am a confirmed Clattenburg hater, but imo, he got two decisions wrong; the handball & not sending off Suarez.

The 'pens' were all dives by City players, just the same way as Suarez dived twice for Liverpool. All involved contact. All involved players who were actively looking to win penalties rather than play football. He chose not to give any & that was 100% correct imo. I wish all refs looked upon those kind of incidents the same way. Clattenburg himself has been conned by similar efforts on many occasions though; perhaps he has got wise to it, but I doubt it. He probably realised Liverpool were going to try & use him to win the game, so decided he would only give real 'nailed on' pens, to either side. Fair play to him. I think he should have booked Zabba for a quite pathetic dive late in the game but let him off as he did Suarez, so can't even argue there really.



City lost the game due to poor team selection & tactics from the manager plus weak defending & some iffy finishing.

Clattenburg imo, did his job better than some City players, & Pellegrini, did theirs.

We are also a soft touch, easy to play against, Bayern, Chelsea, Barca , and very soft with refs, Chelsea will stitch Suarez up big time and let the ref know they are not soft City. To many examples of it, the manager and captain are top class but to fucking nice, to be serial winners, Jose is a cunt IMO ,but he knows what it takes to win ugly if you have to, I don't want him I just think we lack characters and hard nosed personnel.

[Ted Hughes]

as a ref myself, i can say he had a bad game. in the buildup to the first goal there was a clear foul on clichy. suarez backed in to clichy, the ref gave advantage for suarez. suarez played the man and not the ball.

He also gave several 50/50 decisions in our favour during the game which I have often seen go against us. Not his fault that VK defended the situation like a twat & Clichy was too easily muscled off the ball rather than fight for it.

I am no defender of refs & am a confirmed Clattenburg hater, but imo, he got two decisions wrong; the handball & not sending off Suarez.

The 'pens' were all dives by City players, just the same way as Suarez dived twice for Liverpool. All involved contact. All involved players who were actively looking to win penalties rather than play football. He chose not to give any & that was 100% correct imo. I wish all refs looked upon those kind of incidents the same way. Clattenburg himself has been conned by similar efforts on many occasions though; perhaps he has got wise to it, but I doubt it. He probably realised Liverpool were going to try & use him to win the game, so decided he would only give real 'nailed on' pens, to either side. Fair play to him. I think he should have booked Zabba for a quite pathetic dive late in the game but let him off as he did Suarez, so can't even argue there really.



City lost the game due to poor team selection & tactics from the manager plus weak defending & some iffy finishing.

Clattenburg imo, did his job better than some City players, & Pellegrini, did theirs.

We are also a soft touch, easy to play against, Bayern, Chelsea, Barca , and very soft with refs, Chelsea will stitch Suarez up big time and let the ref know they are not soft City. To many examples of it, the manager and captain are top class but to fucking nice, to be serial winners, Jose is a cunt IMO ,but he knows what it takes to win ugly if you have to, I don't want him I just think we lack characters and hard nosed personnel.

I would prefer to keep it that way rather than join them though. I think we can build a team which competes for everything at the very top, every year, without being a bunch of whinging, cheating fucks.

The word is 'compete' though. Nobody just runs away with everything every year. Ferguson had it too easy in recent years, before we came along, but each season now should, hopefully, be a contest; which is how it should be.

There would be no point in watching City win the league every year & our support would become even more like zombie rags than they are turning into already. We have to win some & lose some.

[Tokyo Blue]

There would be no point in watching City win the league every year & our support would become even more like zombie rags than they are turning into already. We have to win some & lose some.

Spot on.

Getting nowhere in the League Cup for 37 seasons, often pathetically but once or twice very unjustly, made the 38th feel absolutely wonderful.

And people who get everything they want are generally wankers (in my experience).

[Hazy2]

as a ref myself, i can say he had a bad game. in the buildup to the first goal there was a clear foul on clichy. suarez backed in to clichy, the ref gave advantage for suarez. suarez played the man and not the ball.

He also gave several 50/50 decisions in our favour during the game which I have often seen go against us. Not his fault that VK defended the situation like a twat & Clichy was too easily muscled off the ball rather than fight for it.

I am no defender of refs & am a confirmed Clattenburg hater, but imo, he got two decisions wrong; the handball & not sending off Suarez.

The 'pens' were all dives by City players, just the same way as Suarez dived twice for Liverpool. All involved contact. All involved players who were actively looking to win penalties rather than play football. He chose not to give any & that was 100% correct imo. I wish all refs looked upon those kind of incidents the same way. Clattenburg himself has been conned by similar efforts on many occasions though; perhaps he has got wise to it, but I doubt it. He probably realised Liverpool were going to try & use him to win the game, so decided he would only give real 'nailed on' pens, to either side. Fair play to him. I think he should have booked Zabba for a quite pathetic dive late in the game but let him off as he did Suarez, so can't even argue there really.



City lost the game due to poor team selection & tactics from the manager plus weak defending & some iffy finishing.

Clattenburg imo, did his job better than some City players, & Pellegrini, did theirs.

We are also a soft touch, easy to play against, Bayern, Chelsea, Barca , and very soft with refs, Chelsea will stitch Suarez up big time and let the ref know they are not soft City. To many examples of it, the manager and captain are top class but to fucking nice, to be serial winners, Jose is a cunt IMO ,but he knows what it takes to win ugly if you have to, I don't want him I just think we lack characters and hard nosed personnel.

I would prefer to keep it that way rather than join them though. I think we can build a team which competes for everything at the very top, every year, without being a bunch of whinging, cheating fucks.

The word is 'compete' though. Nobody just runs away with everything every year. Ferguson had it too easy in recent years, before we came along, but each season now should, hopefully, be a contest; which is how it should be.

There would be no point in watching City win the league every year & our support would become even more like zombie rags than they are turning into already. We have to win some & lose some.

Mate they are not even challenging decisions that are no brainers, vk had to be as dominant as Gerrard or Terry you have to blast a ref when needed Pellers has to do as anyone else including Brendon smarmy bastard Rodgers is doing, watch the build up to the next title decider, Jose will just be doing it in a way we need, Bayern have already started it with refs need to see it from two sides, we were to nice and that is fine, but losers are nice winners are we'll off into the sunset pissing them selfs. Suarez gets to do it again due to a crap ref, dowd. Will be the same as Liverpool are at home again. City are soft.

[Ted Hughes]

Well as I say, I don't want to be like them.

I think we have it about right apart from we should shove all this talk of 'no history' & 'buying the title' down their fucking throats. But I recon the academy is gointg to take care of at least half of that argument in the future.

[Wonderwall]

a level playing field would be nice, I think Liverpool got a massive slice of refereeing bias.

Garcia's yellow was just ridiculous, but flanagan when through the back of Milner with excessive force and all we got was a throw in. Things like this are simple decisions, its not in the box its in the middle of the pitch and in clear view, he bottled it.

[Hazy2]

a level playing field would be nice, I think Liverpool got a massive slice of refereeing bias.

Garcia's yellow was just ridiculous, but flanagan when through the back of Milner with excessive force and all we got was a throw in. Things like this are simple decisions, its not in the box its in the middle of the pitch and in clear view, he bottled it.

Spot on fans of Liverpool and the manager are working the whole package, Louis this , Sunday was back to the 80's the Koop roars then the ref bends over, we have never had refs collapse like Sunday that twat did as required and our team just took it, nice at Anfield on a day like that, we had it in Napoli and Madrid, soft underbelly, if Vieira was captain Clatenburg would have never gone as far as he did.

[Foreverinbluedreams]

I tend to agree Hazy that we are a touch soft in this regard but there's a fine line between sticking up for yourself and becoming a bunch of whining, cheating twats.

[patrickblue]

What a load of sanctimonious rubbish We would have drawn if he or his assistants did what they're paid for and penalised Skrtyl for punching the ball away from Garcia's head in the box.

That's the point, it's all ifs and buts. If they had spotted Skrtel, if they had penalised Vinnie, etc. etc.
We lost the game. I didn't hear Pellers whinging about how it was the refs fault, in fact he came out and said the very opposite.

That isn't the point at all. There are no ifs and buts. The officials didn't do their job correctly.
The point actually is that you are being holier than thou and accusing everyone who disagrees with you of refusing to accept faults in City's game and "taking the easy way out" as you so sanctimoniously put it.
No-one is suggesting that City played a perfect game or the only reason we lost is because of poor refereeing decisions (or at least I'm not, and I've not seen anyone else doing so).
This thread is about the referee, which is why it's entitled "The Ref", and anyone who can say that was even an adequate performance by the officials needs to go to specsavers.

[Beefymcfc]

a level playing field would be nice, I think Liverpool got a massive slice of refereeing bias.

Garcia's yellow was just ridiculous, but flanagan when through the back of Milner with excessive force and all we got was a throw in. Things like this are simple decisions, its not in the box its in the middle of the pitch and in clear view, he bottled it.

Spot on fans of Liverpool and the manager are working the whole package, Louis this , Sunday was back to the 80's the Koop roars then the ref bends over, we have never had refs collapse like Sunday that twat did as required and our team just took it, nice at Anfield on a day like that, we had it in Napoli and Madrid, soft underbelly, if Vieira was captain Clatenburg would have never gone as far as he did.

To be honest, we've gone the complete opposite on this and instead of complaining to the ref with the player, our fans now tend to tell our player to shut the fuck up and get on with it.

It's not just the team who are nice, it may actually stem from our crowd. I remember the days when we used to be hostile and berate the ref/oppo players etc but now we just seem to pick on our own.

A club full of softies, that's what I'm thinking.

[Hazy2]

a level playing field would be nice, I think Liverpool got a massive slice of refereeing bias.

Garcia's yellow was just ridiculous, but flanagan when through the back of Milner with excessive force and all we got was a throw in. Things like this are simple decisions, its not in the box its in the middle of the pitch and in clear view, he bottled it.

Spot on fans of Liverpool and the manager are working the whole package, Louis this , Sunday was back to the 80's the Koop roars then the ref bends over, we have never had refs collapse like Sunday that twat did as required and our team just took it, nice at Anfield on a day like that, we had it in Napoli and Madrid, soft underbelly, if Vieira was captain Clatenburg would have never gone as far as he did.

To be honest, we've gone the complete opposite on this and instead of complaining to the ref with the player, our fans now tend to tell our player to shut the fuck up and get on with it.

It's not just the team who are nice, it may actually stem from our crowd. I remember the days when we used to be hostile and berate the ref/oppo players etc but now we just seem to pick on our own.

A club full of softies, that's what I'm thinking.

Maybe the sign " this is Anfield fuck that the ref and City rolled up tummy tickled, NEXT, Jose will say fuck this, Vieira would have gripped the ref.

[Original Dub]

What a load of sanctimonious rubbish We would have drawn if he or his assistants did what they're paid for and penalised Skrtyl for punching the ball away from Garcia's head in the box.

That's the point, it's all ifs and buts. If they had spotted Skrtel, if they had penalised Vinnie, etc. etc.
We lost the game. I didn't hear Pellers whinging about how it was the refs fault, in fact he came out and said the very opposite.

That isn't the point at all. There are no ifs and buts. The officials didn't do their job correctly.
The point actually is that you are being holier than thou and accusing everyone who disagrees with you of refusing to accept faults in City's game and "taking the easy way out" as you so sanctimoniously put it.
No-one is suggesting that City played a perfect game or the only reason we lost is because of poor refereeing decisions (or at least I'm not, and I've not seen anyone else doing so).
This thread is about the referee, which is why it's entitled "The Ref", and anyone who can say that was even an adequate performance by the officials needs to go to specsavers.

Exactly. Well put.