 | FOOTBALL CLUB |
| FOOTBALL CLUB |
AS CELLULE v FC PIONSAT ST HILAIRE
7th October 2012
THE FARM
MY LIFESTYLE
ON MY TRAVELS
There are more links at the top and bottom of each page.
These concern the administration of the site, but you should visit them just the same.
If you have enjoyed or profited from these pages, please make your next puchase from Amazon via one of the links below.
FOLLOW ME
ON FACEBOOK
As I walked onto the ground here at Cellule, I remembered that this was the place a couple of seasons ago where Pionsat were doing quite well until Franck withdrew Jérôme and Gregory, when the team fell to pieces and only a couple of splendid saves from Matthieu kept them in the game.
This year of course, no Jérôme and Gregory, but luckily Matthieu was out there warming up. I had a feeling that the team was going to need him.
I noticed the referee too. I've seen him quite a few times and he's another one of these referees who likes to be the centre of attention. And when he's been refereeing, Pionsat never seem to have the best of decisions.
And having thought all of that before the kick-off, had I known how the match was to turn out and had this been 350 years ago, I would have been burnt at the stake or drowned in a duck pond.
But enough of this for now - let's return to the game. The line-up is Matthieu in goal, with Frédéric, Sébastien, Michaël and Gaëtan in defence. Midfield is Julién, Vianney, Alex and Emeric, with Cedric and Nico in attack. On the bench are Michaël, Matthieu and Jonathon - quite a strong bench. No Pierre and no Julien.
And Cellule take the lead after just 5 minutes of the match. It's a beautiful cross-field ball to the Cellule n°8 who steps inside his marker and had the goal at his mercy. There's not much that Matthieu could do about that, even though he tries his best and is only half an inch away from making contact with the ball.
What a way to start the match. That's all I can say. At least I was ready with the camera, which was more than you can say for the defence.
A couple of minutes later we almost had one of these embarrassing offside plays, the defenders standing still with their arms raised as a Cellule attacker races towards the goal. Luckily Matthieu is quick off his line to come to the rescue.
Interestingly though, Cedric up in the attack started to hurl abuse at his defenders
"You don't just stand there with your arms raised up like that! You play the ball!"
Obviously Cedric has been reading my notes from earlier matches where I've berated the team for doing this, and where I've also berated the team for not having anyone shouting out the instructions (and hurlling the abuse) whenever it's necessary.
Pionsat pick up the game with another lovely long ball out of defence and is headed on by Julien and then headed on by someone else. Nico then reaches the ball and plays a lovely ball forward over the top right to Cedric.
Cedric gets absolutely everything onto this ball, right over the keeper's head from a narrow angle but the keeper just about gets his hands to it and pushes it over the bar for a corner.
From the corner there's a lovely ball into the area and one of the Pionsat players, who I couldn't see clearly, has a good shot at goal but unfortunately it's straight to the keeper and he hangs on.
But as an aside, look at the two Cellule defenders standing right on the goal line by the near post, and there's another defender over there at the far post. That is good defending, covering the areas out of reach of the goalkeeper. Many teams would push out of defence hoping for an offside decision and that has been the undoing of so many clubs. Not here at Cellule though.
The Pionsat players are desperately pushing forward for an equaliser. It all stems from a weak ball out of the Cellule defence, intercepted by Sébastien who plays the ball forward quickly.
The ball is laid off to Nico who gives it everything he's got from about 12 yards out. That shot has "goal" written all over it but the keeper just about manages to stick out a foot and deflect the ball away to safety and his team breathes a sigh of relief.
Cellule win a free kick out on the left flank and the kicker puts a high ball right into the goalmouth. There's some confusion in the penalty area and one of their forwards nips in in front of Matthieu and has a free header on goal. He has the power but not the direction, and his header goes out for a throw-in after all that.
But notice the difference in the defending. The keeper has come off his line for the ball, but there's only one Pionsat player back covering the goal line there. We saw Cellule a few minutes ago with three defenders covering the goal line.
And if one poor decision by an official can win or lose a match, then what happens next cannot be beaten and, ashamed as I am to say it after all that I promised when I started doing this column, this is the worst decision that I have ever seen an official make on any field of play, beach balls not excluded.
Cellule score their second goal, and the first thing that you notice in this photo is that there is no Matthieu in the shot. So where is Matthieu?
The answer is that Matthieu is flat out on his back on the edge of the penalty area, having received a wicked whack in the face as he went bravely into a crowd of players for a high ball punted into the area by one of the Cellule midfielders.
With Matthieu hors de combat, the action continues and despite some desperate Pionsat defending, kicking the ball off the line twice, it's third time lucky for the Cellule forwards.
When I started writing these notes, I made a very conscious effort that I would, like Ron Atkinson, "never comment on referees and I'm not going to break the habit of a lifetime for that prat", or as Jim Finks, manager of the New Orleans Saints, said after a match against the St Louis Cardinals in 1986, "I'm not allowed to comment on the lousy officiating", however this is one occasion where I'm going to break my promise.
Basically, the whole of the Pionsat team and supporters, Yours Truly not excluded, are thoroughly enraged by this decision of the referee. There is no doubt whatever that Matthieu is hurt to the head and the rules of the Puy-de-Dome football league include one to say that, whether a foul has been committed or not, the game must be stopped in order that the extent of the injury may be examined. We had it drummed into us, when I took a refereeing course, that ensuring the safety of the players was the first duty of any referee, and the ref's decision here made a total mockery of this.
So whether or not a foul was committed - and 999 out of 1,000 referees would have certainly blown for a foul in that incident - the referee was obliged to stop the game to check on Matthieu's injury.
What made the matter even worse, if it were possible to make it worse, was that the referee didn't go over to check up on Matthieu to see how he was feeling after the collision, and restarted the game with Matthieu, still groggily leaning against a goalpost receiving First Aid from Jonathan who had come running off the bench. Continuing the game with a goalkeeper unfit and receiving treatment is also not allowed.
No, despite all my fine promises at the start of all of this, I have to say that in my opinion the decisions by the referee in this incident were totally wrong, and at half-time I made sure that he thoroughly understood my opinions. Where a decision is a matter of opinion, that is fair enough and I'll grind my teeth in anguish but say nothing, but when the decisions are legally incorrect, then I feel that I'm justified in commenting. I just cannot imagine what was going through the head of the referee when he allowed play to continue.
The matter escalates at half-time. Matthieu, who is no shrinking violet, has a frank exchange of views with the referee which results in him asking the referee for an invitation to the wedding of his parents. The referee most cordially agrees, and suggests that maybe Matthieu might like to begin his preparations early by taking his shower during the half-time interval.
And as Matthieu walks past me into the dressing room, one glance into his eyes is enough to tell me that he isn't on the same planet as the rest of us. That was a nasty blow to the head that Matthieu took and even 10 minutes after the incident he's still concussed.
Consequently, Matthieu leaves the field and his place in goal is taken my Michaël, with Nico being withdrawn to make way for him. Because of the referee's, well, poor decision, the game as a spectacle is now over.
Some of Franck's decisions with regard to substitutions sometimes puzzle me, although I do of course have to say that I don't know anything about what goes on on the pitch. But Pionsat have a couple of lightweight midfielders whereas Nico is a tough and gritty uncompromising player who knows how to put himself about and get stuck in. Down to 10 men, the next 45 minutes will be "backs to the wall" stuff, all about defending and with no place for creative midfielders, and if I were out there on the pitch in these circumstances, Nico would be my first choice for a companion.
We have another couple of substitutions as well - Gaëtan and Vianney come off, and Jonathan and Matthieu come on, and I'm not convinced by these substitutions either.
Still, Franck doesn't tell me what photos to take or what to write, so why should I tell him anything about substitutions?
So we start as we have played so many times over the past few seasons, with Pionsat messing around with the ball on the edge of their own penalty area - and losing possession.
"NOOOOOOOOOOO!" yells Bernard from the touchline "DON'T DO THAT!" - showing quite clearly that he's started to read my notes as well.
Anyway, the ball is found by one of their players who is free and he has a good shot on goal. Michaël manages to stick out a foot at the last moment and deflect the ball away from the net - to a huge sigh of relief from the Pionsat camp.
Playing against 10 men, Cellule don't look all that bad and we have a minute or two of glorious one-touch football just now. This ends up with a loose ball into the area, with a race between Michaël and an attacker.
Michaël mistimes his challenge leaving the attacker with a free shot on an open goal but one of the Pionsat defenders, and I wish that I knew who it was, slides the full length of the goal area and makes contact with the ball, pushing it off the goal line and out for a corner.
Four minutes and 50 seconds later (I know this because I forgot to switch off the dictaphone from the previous remark) Cellule scored their third goal, and no-one could have done much about that one. I bet the most surprised person on the pitch was the scorer himself.
A ball from the centre of midfield was played right over the top of the Pionsat defenders and arrived just in front of one of the Cellule attackers who hits it on the volley. 99 times out of 100 this would have been into the trees, into the stand or onto the railway line at the side of the ground, but this one of course has to be the one that screams into the far corner of the net.
Now we have Cedric hobbling off, meaning that Matthieu Sikorsky, who has been playing at left-back since he came on, goes up front and Gaëtan comes back on.
In case you are wondering, in the Puy-de-Dome league, matches are played with rolling substitutions, rather like ice-hockey or gridiron. The teams consist not of 11 but of 14, although only 11 can be on the field at any one time and who come and go as they please.
Cellule's fourth goal is another one right over the top of the Pionsat defence from the right wing after Pionsat lose possession just inside the Cellule half. The ball finds the Cellule n°14 totally on his own, unmarked, with just Michaël to beat.
Michaël's only hope is to hurry the attacker into a shot, hoping that the pressure will put off the attacker, and indeed the attacker does try the early shot, going over Michaël's head. Most of these hurried lobs, especially with this kind of height on them, end up in the stand, in the trees, on the roof of the net or in the fountain in the village square half a mile away, but such is Pionsat's luck this afternoon that of course the ball bounces down onto the line and into the net.
Another long, diagonal ball across field leads to Cellule's fifth goal. It goes down to the left-hand corner of the penalty area and once more there's a one-on-one with Michaël
Michaël holds up the attackers long enough for his defence to rush back to the penalty area and this forces the attacker to pass the ball around his colleagues just inside the Pionsat penalty area. Pionsat can't seem to make an interception and sooner or later one of the Cellule players finds that little half-inch of space, and that is that.
And when your luck is out, then it's well and truly out, and the game ends in tragedy for Pionsat. Just a matter of seconds later, they score a sixth goal.
Well, they don't score a sixth goal, if you want me to be precise. Once more it's a high diagonal ball across field out to the winger. He finds that half-inch gap against the defender and crosses the ball into the area, more in hope than expectation as there are none of his colleagues there to receive the ball.
Michaël steps off his goal line to take an easy catch under no pressure at all, but one of his defenders, making a desperate slide into the area to clear the ball, makes contact with it and slides it into his own net.
A moment of panic, that was, a rush of blood to the head, but it's one of those things that can't be helped. All along since I started doing this, I've been urging the Pionsat defenders to be more positive, because positive action of any kind is far better than inaction of every kind, and so I'm never going to criticise anyone for taking positive action, even if it does sometimes go awry.
Still a minute or so left in the game, and Pionsat's defence is under pressure again. Once more, a high ball into the area, this time from down the right wing, and good on Michaël - he dashes into the middle of a group of players to catch the ball.
He can't hold on to the ball, but his reactions are quicker than everyone else's, and he picks up the ball on the first bounce.
Mind you, look where the Cellule n°14 is, and look where the nearest Pionsat defender is. The defence shouldn't be letting players get in front of them, especially loitering just there. If Michaël hadn't intercepted that ball, the n°14 would have had a simple tap-in.
And so that's that. The heaviest defeat that I've seen Pionsat's 1st XI suffer.
The photos tell their own story. The 1st half when Pionsat had 11 men and a goalkeeper, they may have been 1-0 down but they were constantly pressing forward and had the Cellule defence under the cosh for pretty much of that period. The second half, with just 10 men and no goalkeeper, it was all one-way traffic. The poor decision by the referee totally changed the game.
Of course, three of the Cellule goals in the second half were goals out of nothing and in any other match they would never have been scored. But still, they went into the net and that's all that counts.
Never mind the match, though. I've been reading and re-reading my remarks, especially my comments about the referee, and while I know that I promised that I would never ever criticise a referee for a decision, I really can't let this decision pass by without saying what I think.
As I said, it's not a decision based on "opinion". We all know that people's opinions differ, because of course they see the same thing differently and from a different viewpoint and perspective. This was a decision based on the rules of the game here in the Puy-de-Dome. Matthieu was "out" with a head injury and the referee was obliged to stop play. This was what we had drummed into us time and time again on the refereeing course that I took.
Furthermore, the referee should never have allowed the game to restart without checking up on Matthieu's injury and making sure that he had received the appropriate amount of treatment. That's not "opinion" either, but also based on the rules of the game here in the Puy-de-Dome.
In my opinion, these were dreadful mistakes by the referee. They completely changed the complexion of the game and they will have consequences that will reach far beyond the final whistle, and for many people too.
Anyway, make the most of my comments because I imagine that once a different light of day has dawned, I may well have another look at what I've written and have another think about my remarks.
Back to the footy page
Il y a sans doute des francophones qui aimeraient lire cette page en français. Donc vous devez m'aider á la traduire!
En plus, si vous avez des choses á ajouter,
home page | latest updates | site map | site index
about this site | audience participation | copyright notice | technical issues | accessibility statement | read this | contact me
©
