00:00 *intro*
00:03 Hello everybody, Adam Cleary, 442 here and nope, still not got that studio sorted.
00:08 Working on it, absolutely promise.
00:10 Anyway, Mateo Kovacic.
00:12 You know him, he's the football player for Manchester City who did this...
00:17 *pause*
00:20 And then did this...
00:22 *pause*
00:25 All within like a couple of minutes of each other and just...
00:28 Wasn't sent off...
00:30 Somehow.
00:31 Now I presume that you, like me, consider yourself a relatively intelligent person
00:35 who understands both the nuances and the intricacies and the laws of this game of football.
00:39 You're probably scratching your head at that thinking,
00:42 "I'm pretty sure that first one should have been a red card and I'm pretty sure even if it wasn't,
00:46 that second one should have been a yellow card."
00:48 And just doing the maths here, one red, that equals ascending off,
00:51 with two yellows, they equal ascending off.
00:54 You probably couldn't work out why he was still on the pitch.
00:57 But don't worry everybody, it's absolutely fine.
01:00 Everything's going to be okay because whistling Thanos Howard Webb,
01:04 he's done yet another episode of Ref Say The Funniest Things with Michael Owen,
01:09 in which they go through all the decisions and they show you the VAR playback
01:12 and they try and make you think that referees are just normal, like me and you.
01:15 And in their most recent episode, he was able to sit down with Michael Owen,
01:19 who, believe it or not, is actually standing in this photo,
01:21 and tell us why Kovacic wasn't sent off.
01:24 There were reasons, you see.
01:25 So, yeah, with there being no actual football happening right now,
01:30 and there not even being a transfer window to make up for it,
01:34 let's just overanalyse that for a bit.
01:35 So, it's Arsenal versus Man City, it's the 34th minute,
01:40 it's been incredibly tense, and William Saliba lays a short pass into Martin Odegaard,
01:45 just on the halfway line.
01:47 Kovacic, who's clearly been instructed to try and press in this area if he sees an opportunity,
01:52 thinks he might have sprung a trap here, and races after Odegaard to try and beat him to the ball.
01:57 The Norwegian's alive to the danger, though, he matches his run and he gets to it ahead of him.
02:02 Now, just as an aside here, if you think this is a rash decision,
02:04 then just have a look at where it would have left City.
02:07 With Kovacic winning the ball and presumably dumping Odegaard on his arse in the process,
02:12 that would have put himself, Foden and Haaland in a 3v2 against Saliba and Gabriel,
02:17 with a lot of space to run into.
02:20 He genuinely does need to try and make this challenge.
02:23 But, sadly for City and him, he doesn't get the ball and catches Odegaard really quite badly.
02:28 He's late, he's left his feet, he's caught the player fractionally above the angle,
02:33 and it's arguable that the angle is quote-unquote "from behind".
02:37 Michael Oliver is immediately on the scene, brandishing a yellow card.
02:41 It's at this point, though, the commentary suggests that he might well be in trouble,
02:45 as the decision goes to VAR and the replays show that, yes, it is quite a bad tackle.
02:51 Now, given the recent sendings off of Curtis Jones and Male Gusto,
02:55 both only fractionally late, not high, but certainly above the angle,
02:59 and not forceful, but certainly lacking enough control to make it safe,
03:03 this looks all the world like he's going to be asked to go to the monitor.
03:07 But, he's not, to the bafflement of fans, commentators, Arsenal's players, and Michael Arteta,
03:12 who has by now seen the replay himself.
03:15 So, what's the difference between this and these?
03:19 Well, Howard Webb's first assessment was that if it had been immediately given as a red card,
03:25 the VAR team would have looked at that and instantly confirmed it was the right decision.
03:30 They would not have asked Michael Oliver to reconsider it.
03:32 But the reason both Oliver and the VAR team were happy to go simply with a yellow card here is this.
03:39 If you look at it from this angle, you can sort of see that the point of contact for Kovacic on Odegaard
03:46 isn't fully studs on leg.
03:48 He's come in fractionally from the side and thus caught him with the side of his foot.
03:54 It's still bad, mate, don't get me wrong, it could and probably should be a red,
03:58 but the fact of the angle and the point of contact means he's far, far less likely to cause any sort of injury to his opponent.
04:06 There is still that telltale buckling of the leg though, which as we saw when Webb reviewed the Malagusta red card,
04:12 was the main thing VAR wanted to bring the referee's attention to.
04:16 But that's caused here only initially by the contact and not worsened with any sort of follow-through.
04:22 And this is the thing you need to understand about VAR.
04:25 They can see on that replay that it could be a red, but because they've examined the exact angle and point of contact,
04:31 they can also see that, yeah, you can get away with just a yellow there.
04:36 It becomes a subjective call, and in cases of subjectivity or where the on-field decision isn't factually or even technically wrong,
04:45 VAR is not supposed to intervene.
04:47 Now, as for how we avoided the second yellow for this follow-up tackle though, you'd have to ask Michael Oliver that one.
04:54 Webb himself saying on the show that Kovacic was an extremely fortunate player to stay on the pitch.
05:00 One interesting insight he did give here though, is that in these situations, referees are often hamstrung by a need to neither over nor under react to these fouls.
05:11 Whenever a player is on a yellow card, every little thing they do is going to be greeted by an outcry from the opposition to brandish a second card and send them off,
05:20 regardless of whether it merits it or not.
05:23 Oliver's immediate reaction here of notifying both the Arsenal players and the fans that he's not going to book him again,
05:30 clearly shows that he doesn't feel for a second this foul on Rice merits a card.
05:35 Which puts him in a weird position, because with the first foul being so close to being a red,
05:40 it almost feels like it shouldn't matter how egregious a second offence is.
05:45 He should just go for merely having made it.
05:48 But the reality is that there isn't a points system here, there aren't certain yellow cards that are worth more than others.
05:54 Every single foul has to be judged on its own merits, and Oliver's decision not to overreact here,
06:01 does ironically, when you see the replay, mean he technically underreacts.
06:06 And of course it's not in VAR's remit to get involved with any potential yellow card offences, so no chance of them dialing in and saying...
06:13 [Oli and Matt talking over each other]
06:39 And there you go, those are the reasons why Matty Okavicic wasn't sent off.
06:44 And you know what? Now that I've heard that explanation, the more I look at it, the more I still don't understand why he wasn't sent off.
06:51 Hey, do you know what? As they say, every cloud has a silver lining, and I have heard direct from Arsenal fans themselves,
06:57 that it was actually better that he stayed on the pitch, because it was sweeter to win against 11 men.
07:02 Look, here's one.
07:03 [Oli and Matt talking over each other]
07:08 So anyway, there you go, if you sat through all of that, then I'm just really, really sorry.
07:12 There was nothing else to talk about today.
07:14 You can go and grab me over on Twitter and demand those minutes of your life back.
07:18 Why not? @AlanClearyClery.
07:20 The entire 442 social spectrum is in the corner of the video, you know that by now.
07:25 And why not consider subscribing to us here on 442?
07:28 We just hit 451 subscribers.
07:31 451,000 subscribers, and that's another formation, so that's fun.
07:35 We've got that Scotland 4-6-0 coming up next, which nobody wants reminding of, so help us get there, that'll be nice.
07:41 Until next time though, thank you very much for watching.
07:43 I'm away to hand out two incredibly soft yellow cards, just to go and make up for that.
07:48 But until next time, I've been Adam Cleary, this has been 442, and I'll see you soon. Bye!
07:53 [outro music]
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