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#Post#: 75788--------------------------------------------------
L SMITH - Fulham v Villa
DIR By: TheThingFromLewes
Date: February 17, 2024, 8:41 am
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Best wishes to him today. Has a big smile on his face already
whilst warming up.
Black by the way.. must’ve left the yellow kit at home!
#Post#: 75792--------------------------------------------------
Re: L SMITH - Fulham v Villa
DIR By: TheThingFromLewes
Date: February 17, 2024, 9:55 am
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Well a few grumbles and groans from both sets of fans during the
first half.
A couple of penalty shouts that were waved away and cleared by
VAR. McGinn in the book for a late challenge on Pereira which
sparked a furious exchange between Boa Morte and Emery. He did
play a good advantage and then went back to get the card out.
It’s been a testing first half for him but so far he’s done ok.
Has tried to let it flow and let some of the physical stuff pass
by without interfering.
VAR has been busy with offside.
#Post#: 75795--------------------------------------------------
Re: L SMITH - Fulham v Villa
DIR By: takethejag
Date: February 17, 2024, 11:14 am
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The Fulham rookie gamble backfired massively on this occasion.
Smith started quite well, but by the end was totally out of his
depth and had lost control, although it made for an entertaining
game.
Between him and his team there were a litany of errors, a missed
penalty for both teams, a wrongly disallowed goal for Villa (it
seemed), haphazard foul detection, a clear corner missed, much
unpunished time-wasting by Martinez, a deliberate back pass went
unpunished and at least 3 minutes were lost during added time
and not added back on. Towards the end it was mistake after
mistake with yellow cards like confetti for mostly innocuous
challenges or the resultant dissent from the player disbelief.
As (I think it was) TTFL pointed out in the appointments thread,
this fixture has has a fiery history at times, so not definitely
not the game to test a rookie referee and that proved to be the
case.
#Post#: 75798--------------------------------------------------
Re: L SMITH - Fulham v Villa
DIR By: TheThingFromLewes
Date: February 17, 2024, 11:32 am
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The second half was extremely poor I’m afraid.
Quite a few iffy decisions and the cards were out in a flash.
Palhinha’s looked harsh.
Tempers on the touch line boiled over and it threatened to get
very awkward. A couple of cards brandished toward the dugout
teams as well for complaining.
How Martinez wasn’t carded for time wasting was ridiculous, and
the added time certainly didn’t add up to what should have been
played.
An unfortunate debut for him.
#Post#: 75799--------------------------------------------------
Re: L SMITH - Fulham v Villa
DIR By: takethejag
Date: February 17, 2024, 11:37 am
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--- Quote from: TheThingFromLewes link ---
>
> The second half was not very good at all I’m afraid.
>
> Quite a few iffy decisions and the cards were out in a flash.
Tempers on the touch line boiled over and it threatened to get
very awkward.
>
> How Martinez wasn’t carded for time wasting wax ridiculous,
and the added tone certainly didn’t add up to what should have
been played.
>
> An unfortunate debut for him.
>
--- End Quote ---
Apparently the ball was only in play for 57 seconds of the added
5
I don't always agree with the fans on X and their knee-jerk
reactions but it's hard to swim against the tide this evening
with all the negativity about his performance. What I would say
is, as bad as his perfomance was ultimately, it had NO bearing
on the final score, Villa were more clinical in front of goal.
#Post#: 75800--------------------------------------------------
Re: L SMITH - Fulham v Villa
DIR By: RefGod
Date: February 17, 2024, 11:50 am
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Considering Villa's position in the table and his relative lack
of experience, this seems to have been a reckless appointment.
#Post#: 75801--------------------------------------------------
Re: L SMITH - Fulham v Villa
DIR By: TheThingFromLewes
Date: February 17, 2024, 12:17 pm
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Adama was also lucky not to see red after he threw the ball away
in an aggressive manner after conceding a free kick despite
being on a yellow too.
Unfortunately, I don’t think we will see Smith again for a while
in the Premier League, but I hope this is a learning curve for
him.
I would add England was struggling to control the touch line too
and Smart had to come in and help when things got really tetchy.
#Post#: 75806--------------------------------------------------
Re: L SMITH - Fulham v Villa
DIR By: Craven
Date: February 17, 2024, 2:17 pm
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Just back from the game. I genuinely write this with a heavy
heart, but that was very comfortably the worst refereeing
performance I’ve seen at The Cottage this season, and perhaps
even for a few seasons.
As someone on here previously alluded to, these refs are
possibly given their debut at Craven Cottage due to the fairness
of the crowd and it’s a nice environment to ease them in. I
believe there’s probably some truth in that. Well, at the final
whistle today, the whole ground (not Villa fans obviously) were
as loud as I’ve ever heard, singing ‘you’re not fit to referee’.
I think Lewis Smith set his stall out today to let the game
flow. I’m all in favour of that, as long as you still have a
modicum of control. By the last 15 minutes it was carnage, he
had completely lost the plot and it was anything goes territory.
You just had no idea what he was going to do next. It was chaos.
There was a Fulham shot towards the end that took a massive
deflection, and I mean massive, nothing subtle about it. All the
players, Villa’s included, set up for a corner, only to see
Smith pointing for a goal kick. He was the only person in the
ground to think it wasn’t a corner. Why his assistants didn’t
have a word in his ear, I don’t know. That turned an already
rattled crowd into something I’ve never witnessed at Fulham. It
became poisonous and toxic, all of it aimed in Smith’s direction
for the last 10 minutes or so.
Smith then decided on just 5 minutes of injury time, despite
Martinez deploying world class timewasting tactics for the
entirety of the second half, along with a VAR check that took
ages. In that 5 minutes, a Villa player was down injured and
received treatment for over two minutes. Martinez again took an
age over a goal kick. There was a substitution.
Smith played 20 seconds over 5 minutes and then blew the final
whistle.
This was the catalyst for the derogatory songs in Smith’s
direction that I mentioned before.
I’ve checked out a couple of Fulham forums in the three hours or
so since the game, and every single post has mentioned how poor
the referee was.
I really didn’t want to write a review of this ilk about Smith,
but he was SO bad, there was no alternative
#Post#: 75809--------------------------------------------------
Re: L SMITH - Fulham v Villa
DIR By: Claretman
Date: February 17, 2024, 2:46 pm
---------------------------------------------------------
--- Quote from: takethejag link ---
>
> The Fulham rookie gamble backfired massively on this occasion.
>
> Smith started quite well, but by the end was totally out of
his depth and had lost control, although it made for an
entertaining game.
>
> Between him and his team there were a litany of errors, a
missed penalty for both teams, a wrongly disallowed goal for
Villa (it seemed), haphazard foul detection, a clear corner
missed, much unpunished time-wasting by Martinez, a deliberate
back pass went unpunished and at least 3 minutes were lost
during added time and not added back on. Towards the end it was
mistake after mistake with yellow cards like confetti for mostly
innocuous challenges or the resultant dissent from the player
disbelief.
>
> As (I think it was) TTFL pointed out in the appointments
thread, this fixture has has a fiery history at times, so not
definitely not the game to test a rookie referee and that proved
to be the case.
>
--- End Quote ---
Martinez is a very good goalkeeper but he is also very good at
gamesmanship too.
A shame that it sounds like the game got too big for the referee
but as i said in the appointments thread clashes between these
two teams over the years that i have witnessed, have tended to
be very feisty and many a top class referee has struggled to
keep in control of things, so not the best match to appoint a
newbie to.
Hope this is a big learning curve for Lewis Smith and that he
goes on to prosper in times to come.
#Post#: 75810--------------------------------------------------
Re: L SMITH - Fulham v Villa
DIR By: TheThingFromLewes
Date: February 17, 2024, 2:52 pm
---------------------------------------------------------
--- Quote from: Craven link ---
>
> Just back from the game. I genuinely write this with a heavy
heart, but that was very comfortably the worst refereeing
performance I’ve seen at The Cottage this season, and perhaps
even for a few seasons.
> As someone on here previously alluded to, these refs are
possibly given their debut at Craven Cottage due to the fairness
of the crowd and it’s a nice environment to ease them in. I
believe there’s probably some truth in that. Well, at the final
whistle today, the whole ground (not Villa fans obviously) were
as loud as I’ve ever heard, singing ‘you’re not fit to referee’.
> I think Lewis Smith set his stall out today to let the game
flow. I’m all in favour of that, as long as you still have a
modicum of control. By the last 15 minutes it was carnage, he
had completely lost the plot and it was anything goes territory.
You just had no idea what he was going to do next. It was chaos.
> There was a Fulham shot towards the end that took a massive
deflection, and I mean massive, nothing subtle about it. All the
players, Villa’s included, set up for a corner, only to see
Smith pointing for a goal kick. He was the only person in the
ground to think it wasn’t a corner. Why his assistants didn’t
have a word in his ear, I don’t know. That turned an already
rattled crowd into something I’ve never witnessed at Fulham. It
became poisonous and toxic, all of it aimed in Smith’s direction
for the last 10 minutes or so.
> Smith then decided on just 5 minutes of injury time, despite
Martinez deploying world class timewasting tactics for the
entirety of the second half, along with a VAR check that took
ages. In that 5 minutes, a Villa player was down injured and
received treatment for over two minutes. Martinez again took an
age over a goal kick. There was a substitution.
> Smith played 20 seconds over 5 minutes and then blew the final
whistle.
> This was the catalyst for the derogatory songs in Smith’s
direction that I mentioned before.
> I’ve checked out a couple of Fulham forums in the three hours
or so since the game, and every single post has mentioned how
poor the referee was.
> I really didn’t want to write a review of this ilk about
Smith, but he was SO bad, there was no alternative
>
--- End Quote ---
I was sat a few seats away from the technical area and things
were getting really nasty on the touchline…
I have to agree, that’s the most toxic atmosphere I’ve heard at
CC in many a year, and it was ferocious at times, particularly
towards the end when things went completely off the rails in
spectacular fashion.
Today’s message… perhaps it may alter the perception of giving
new officials their debuts there at CC on a high risk fixture.
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