42 GHAUSA Merk

Ghana defeated the United States by two goals to one and became the surprise nation to escape the so-called group of death behind Italy. The most controversial of the three scores came minutes before the halftime whistle - the West African nation were awarded a contested penalty by the referee Markus Merk. It was to be the home referee's last assignment at World Cup 2006.

Sometimes it just isn't your year - Merk took a month-long break before the start of the subsequent domestic season as he struggled to understand how he wasn't appointed for a game in the knockout stages in his home World Cup. Actually I have a lot of sympathy with the referee from Germany: everything conspired against him despite handling three games quite well in my view. And let me try to change your mind on that penalty...

Key Match Incident

+46' Penalty to Ghana (charging) - given

The replays certainly don't do any favours for Merk - to be honest, the foul looks so trifling that it looks like an even parodical penalty decision. 

My conviction is that Merk actually correctly spotted a charging / impeding foul which is visible from the live sequence. From the poor defensive header, Pimpong has won the optimal position to try and jump for the ball - Onyewu realises that, and tries to reach the ball himself. In so order to do that he just charges through the better-positioned attacker.

The name of the game in the World Cup as a referee is to not arouse unnecessary attention to yourself - this decision epitomises "unnecessary attention", with the watching world quite understandably baffled with his call. Merk clearly wasn't thinking of that with his instant (and in my view, correct or at least defendable) penalty call. His optimal positioning (in the diagonal channel) probably didn't help him here! Merk was already in trouble with regard to further games, and this surely tipped him over the edge. 

Approach

Referee opted to issue two early cautions - a clearly reckless tackle by Essien and a harsh booking for a handling offence by Lewis; one for each team. After that, Merk offered the players quite a lot of discretion - in addition to brilliantly punishing a reckless elbow in the mid-part of the first half. Despite issuing two early cards, I am not sure how much they constituted a game-plan or just a hand forced but the referee from Germany ensured that he did not shoot all his munition too early, and he steered this important game to a good conclusion. Also - was the challenge before the opening goal a foul or just a fair (but painful) duel?

Relatively busy afternoon for both assistants - Jan-Hendrik Salver was not as busy as Christian Schräer who made an important mistake at 68', in a busy few minutes for the benchside AR where he was otherwise correct. 

So - why was one of the world's top referees left out from the knockout stages?

The penalty widely judged as not just incorrect but totally wrong in this game cannot have helped. Nor can FIFA publicly calling Merk's reporting of the incident mentioned by HowardMaxi at the end of the Brazil - Australia game as "inconsistent". Though, Merk was good in all three of his group matches. But perhaps more than anything, it was stylistic considerations that counted against Merk in 2006 - he was hardly invisible in his matches (just like Óscar Ruiz, who was also eliminated at the group stage); Merk's style was simply not in vogue. Sometimes, it just isn't your year. 

Markus Merk - 8,4 Christian Schräer - 8,3 Jan-Hendrik Salver - 8,4 Tōru Kamikawa Hiroshima Yoshikazu GER – JPN	Ghana 2-1 United States Group Stage
Essien (5.) - Tackle Illiasu (32.) - Striking Mensah (81.) - SPA (Impeding) Appiah (90.+1') - Delaying the Restart	Lewis (7.) - SPA (Handling)