56 ESPFRA Rosetti

Spain were perhaps the most impressive nation in advancing from the group stage and could seriously believe that they could finally belie their reputation of underachievers, but were defeated by a much-improved France in a classic Round of Sixteen match. After three relatively modest group stage assignments, Roberto Rosetti's trio from Italy got a big one here. Rosetti convinced in those three matches, but he showed simply excellent form here - referee from Italy gave a masterclass in leadership on a football pitch. Faultless? No - but quite exemplary, without any doubt. Let's start with the most important decisions that Rosetti had to face.

Key Match Incidents

27' - Penalty to Spain (tripping)

Very well-spotted by Rosetti; okay the tackle is reckless and a caution should follow, but I would sooner praise him for detecting the foul than criticise him for that. His manner in dealing with the protesting France players was pretty formidable too, and worth highlighting in classroom examples.  

32' - Serious Foul Play by France no.22?

Rosetti totally missed this foul, but in my view it was only reckless (- 0,1) and not deserving of an ejection. Despite the hitting point, the force is relatively trifling, and does not reach a threshold for SFP. 

73' - Second Yellow Card to France no.4?

The trickiest incident to assess, is there any scope to evaluate the striking foul as careless? I would argue that there is - the arm is out of a shielding not striking nature, and the actual contact is not that intense. On a theoretical level, I would not call this situation a black-white caution.

In a way it's a discussion which is quite abstract; practically, only an idiot would eject someone in a World Cup match for a foul like that, which Rosetti surely thought too. 

Approach

Roberto Rosetti gave a masterclass in how to lead two sets of players (from high ability nations and non-Eastern culture) in an optimal way on a football pitch. He refereed all three of his group matches (MEXIRN - ARGSCG - PARTRI) well, but this match gave the referee from Italy a perfect canvas to display his ability. 

Actually until the correctly awarded penalty the match was very fair with both sets of players focused on playing football and not disturbing their opponents. It's relatively trivial but the incident at 5' I found highly amusing - I am quite sure that Henry was applauding the skill of the ball kicked to him and not indicating that he handled it (he did, as it happened) as one of Rosetti's teammates informed him. The bemused look of a man who had inadvertently given himself away!

After the penalty scored, Rosetti had to make himself more involved and the match started to become more fractious and the referee succeeded in two crucial areas: 1) working against Delaying the Restart cases (it is possible to do this with presence, mimics, gestures, whistle language (-> prevention) and not just yellow cards!); 2) without the need for formal verbal warnings but personality letting the players know how close they were to exceeding Rosetti's generous but not overly-lenient line. 

Rosetti went too far though at 67' - although the cause of the tackle was a slip, he had to really open the cards here and draw the line in the sand. While the solution of ordering the France player to apologise to his fouled opponent was optimal of itself, the moment had come to open the cards. The tackle was also clearly reckless in my view (- 0,1). Rosetti realised his match-management mistake, and booked a matter of seconds later for a more trifling foul by a France player in the midfield. This almost cost him the game at 73'.

While not a crucial decision, it was certainly very important - the controversial freekick awarded before the decisive goal for France in the last ten minutes. Widely seen as wrong fourteen years ago, I think the referees team got this one spot on. Don't watch the replay, watch the live sequence - Puyol changes his running path in so order to unfairly prevent Henry from reaching the ball (he does not go to the ball as the crow would fly). 

The decision was surely on AR Cristiano Copelli's shout - a player runs into Rosetti while he is sprinting to keep up with the dynamic counter-attack, and on three occasions he looks out to Copelli; a perfect use of the comms kit! So the decision was at least not wrong, I would argue it was simply correct and actually brilliantly detected. 

The two cautions at the end were correct and well-placed. 

A short observation about Rosetti: I think his adrenaline was really flowing before and during this one, his presence was even slightly hectic especially in the early stages! My thesis was that with very little to do at the start, there was little to calm him down. In the end it probably worked in his favour; his handling of the game was excellent, his physical condition very good (great mover despite his tall frame). 

Both Cristiano Copelli and Alessandro Stagnoli especially were extensively challenged in their judgement of offside situations. Stagnoli was good but made one evident mistake and a further important mistake; Copelli was less-challenged, but good throughout. Onsides played for both France's equaliser and the clinching, additional time goal were excellent examples for how officials can contribute positively to the playing of football!

Balance

Roberto Rosetti excelled - he masterfully showed how in terms of decisions, manner and fitness to handle a World Cup game on the highest level. His performance would have been on an excellent (9,0) level if he didn't miss one yellow card and forgive another. Rosetti showed here, as he did in less demanding circumstances in the Mexico - Iran tie, that he can find and execute the optimal way to lead both sets of players and the match to a good conclusion. 

I posed the same notion at the head of my analysis of Pierluigi Collina's performance in the World Cup 2002 Final in a perhaps provocative manner, but this time concerning Roberto Rosetti I ask quite sincerely - the best referee ever?

Roberto Rosetti - 8,8 Cristiano Copelli - 8,4 Alessandro Stagnoli - 8,2 Markus Merk Christian Schräer ITA – GER	Spain 1-3 France Round of Sixteen
Puyol (82.) - SPA (Impeding)	Vieira (68.) - Tackle Ribéry (87.) - Delaying the Restart Zidane (+91.) - Tackle