USA Men's National Soccer Team Advances to 2nd Round of the World Cup

I realize this blog post is a bit off-topic for my site. But, I had to take a moment to express my enthusiasm and support for the U.S. Men's Soccer team in their 1-0 victory over Algeria; putting them as the winner of their group and advancing them to the Round of Sixteen.

For those that saw the game—it was a nail biter! The U.S. team again received a bad call by the referees! Come on! These guys are supposed to be the best officials in the world! And they are at least supposed to get the big calls right! But, they again robbed the U.S. of a critical goal that would have given the U.S. squad a lead fairly early in the match. The Assistant Referee raised his flag for offside and the goal was not counted. However, the replay shows that the goal scorer was clearly not offside. And, in cases of doubt FIFA instructs that the benefit of doubt should go to the attacker! Not so in this case!

I am a USSF Level 7 referee. I am working on becoming a level 6. The Word Cup officials are Level 1s. It's very hard as a referee to see these guys getting the big calls wrong! It was horrible that the referee called a "phantom" foul and disallow America's game-winning goal in the first match! But, "mistakes happen", you say. What are the odds it would happen again! That same official also called handling on the U.S. team when it clearly wasn't - and gave a yellow card to the player forcing him to sit out a match. Then, to disallow a goal today when the U.S. needs a victory for an offside call that never was!!! That's heinous!

There have been other bad calls, too! Like the one where Brazil's star player is given his second yellow (therefore a red) and forced to leave the game, for Brazil to play short, and to lose their star player for the next game!

When Landon Donovan finally put the winning goal in the net in what seemed to be the 91st minute (1 minute into stoppage time), it was fantastic. I'm so happy for him; so happy for the squad; and so happy for fellow soccer fans in America!

Go U.S.A.

I truly believe we could win it all!