The Tigers won a controversial encounter in the Second City on Saturday
Former Premier League referee Dermot Gallagher and striker Jay Bothroyd have both had their say on the big decisions that engulfed Saturday’s thriller between Birmingham City and Hull City.
City were 3-2 winners at St Andrew’s as they ended their long, long wait for back-to-back wins and in the process, inflicted a first home league defeat on the Blues after a 29-game unbeaten streak.
The scoreline, however, doesn’t begin to tell the story of what was a game filled with controversy, so much so it was given a 10-minute segment on Sky Sports’ Ref Watch show as they dissected the performance of fledging Championship official Ruebyn Ricardo.
Up for discussion was the mistaken identity which saw John Egan booked for a foul committed by Matt Crooks, which would have seen Crooks sent off five minutes from time.
There was also Charlie Hughes’ challenge on Keshi Anderson in the first half that could have been a Blues penalty, Jack Robinson’s red card and then the big melee just before half-time.
Here’s what the pair had to say…
Gallagher and Bothroyd on Egan being booked when Crooks committed a foul
DG: Tough afternoon for the referee, I watched a lot of this game and it was really a tough match for him. He’s of the opinion that John Egan committed the foul. It’s a colleague who commits the foul. He’s (Crooks) already on a yellow card, so he would have been sent off.
JB: To be honest, I don’t even understand. It’s not even the referee is that far away. He should see that. That is just a terrible decision. Again, I watched that as soon as we came in, and I’m baffled as to why the referee can’t see that.
DG: He’s also got the fourth official right there as well, who could have fed some information to him, maybe, even if he called him across and said, Look, what have you seen? He might still have stuck to his original decision, but he’s got time, hasn’t he? The ball’s dead, so you go across, get a bit of information.
JB: Do you know that one there as well, Dermot? Do you know that when you said the fourth official there? Do you think it’s a case of the fourth official not wanting to get involved and just letting the referee say, ‘Hey, do your job? I know he’s meant to be there to support, but sometimes you just think, you know what, I don’t want to get involved. Maybe he was looking somewhere else.
DG: Yeah, there is that, but. If he’s there and he’s seen it, I just think that it’s an opportunity with the ball dead. Pool your information. I’ll go across to you, or you call me across and say Look, Are you sure what you’ve seen? Explain what you’ve seen’, Have a little chat. He might still come to the same decision, I get that, but it might just trigger in his head, ‘oh hang on, I’ve got this wrong.’ What you’re hoping as a referee is you can gather as much information as possible to come to the optimum decision.
On the penalty shouts
JB: This is a penalty all day long, every day. The attacker’s got round him, and this is just clumsy from the defender. He’s got round him, he’s pushed him over. He’s not got no intention of playing the ball. I mean, the defender needs to be thinking, where is he actually going? He’s going towards the byline. I don’t know why he’s even making that challenge anyway, penalty.
DG: “I think penalty as well. I think a penalty because he’s had a feel of him. He’s had a feel of him, so he knows where he is. No need to make that challenge. It’s clumsy.
JB: One hundred per cent, as the ball bounces, the attacker is in possession of that ball. He’s probably gonna control that, maybe play it back to the winger, but the defender there, he doesn’t need to make that challenge. That’s just clumsy, that’s impatient. The manager will be saying to him, ‘Why are you making that decision, why are you making that challenge for there?’ He’s not going anywhere. All of his teammates will be upset with him, and his manager will be upset with him as well. It’s just a poor challenge from the defender, no need.
What they made of Robinson’s sending off
DG: Referees go in, and Rueben’s obviously felt, you know, referees don’t send off players if they can help it. They send off players when they need to. And I think if a player’s sent off for dissent after having a yellow card, he’s really crossed the line, because that referee will need to be sure that’s it. It’s got to be worthy of a red card, and if he’s done that, he deserves everything he gets.
JB: I agree with that. I do agree with that, but I mean, Dermot, when you were refereeing, I know it was a long time ago, no, but I mean, as long as it’s not complete abuse, swearing, insults, everything like that. I just think you’re on a pitch, you wanna win, and I feel like sometimes, throwing your hands up in the air because you think that it’s a wrong decision, I don’t think it’s that bad. When you start throwing insults and swearing, that’s different. Obviously, we don’t know what was actually said; maybe he was throwing insults.
JB: In that case, it’s the right decision, but if he’s just throwing his hands up, saying, ‘How’s that a foul, what are you talking about, ‘ then I’m looking at that saying it shouldn’t be a yellow card.
DG: As you said, we don’t know what he said, and I go back to what I said, that a referee isn’t gonna send somebody off for nothing. It’s gonna be something that’s, he’s gone, this is serious enough to be a red card.
And the brawl
JB: He got the ball, though. That’s all I’m gonna say straight away. That is really aggressive (Joseph’s challenge), and it doesn’t need to be, but I mean the referee, Dermott’s going to say, he could have just given the foul, it would have stopped everything else.
DG: Well, I’m of that belief: My best friend is always keep it safe, keep it simple. That’s his mantra when he’s coaching referees. He’s good at that; I don’t do that, but that’s what he tells me. And I just think if, if you’re starting out as a referee, an incident like that happens, if you watch, bang, it’s right in front of the dugout, you give a foul. Everybody will accept that’s a foul; he might argue he’s got the ball, but everybody will accept that’s a foul, and it stops all this.
JB: Now the players are upset, now they’re all reacting.
DG: The ball hasn’t left the scene, it’s right in front of the dugout as well, and (Jay) Stansfield then takes the law into his own hands.
JB: I’ll tell you what I’m noticing there, look where the referee’s standing. Why is he not going there and getting involved and trying to calm things down and split things up? He’s just standing there watching. That’s the part that I don’t understand because a referee is there to make the decisions, pull people apart, and calm people down as well. I think that was an opportunity for the referee there to get involved and say, ‘Hey, come on, split it up.’
DG Well, he’s not there to pull players apart because what you have to remember is, if I go in and start pulling you apart and you take a swing at a player and unfortunately catch me, you’re in big, big trouble, aren’t you? In that situation, he’s probably thought, I’ll stand back, have a panoramic view. Is he going to stop by going in there? Is he going to stop that amount of players?
JB: But the official would do the same, like when the players are trying to come on. He’ll be like shepherding them back, you know, so obviously he’s getting slightly involved more than the referee would, and I just feel like that was an opportunity there for a referee to use common sense and just come in and just try and calm everything down.
JB: He’s standing ten yards away, not getting involved. The initial player, I don’t know if it’s the captain or not, goes up to the referee, but then he goes towards all this incident that’s happening, and I feel like the referee could have diffused that if he had gone closer to the incident rather than just standing where he was.
DG: I talk a lot about root cause and remedy, and the root cause is a free kick wasn’t given. I know I’m sounding like a record, but give a free kick. You just give that free kick, it all goes away, and you don’t have this aftermath.
JB: I think there will still be arguments because it was an aggressive challenge, but definitely all 22 players that are coming together basically and causing that big commotion on the pitch, that definitely wouldn’t have happened, so I agree with Dermot on that one.
DG: He had two bits of bad luck, didn’t he, really. In so much as by not giving that free kick, the play goes on and it never left the area, it was always in that area in front of the dugout, so emotions are high. It went on and in the end, Jay Stansfield took the law into his own hands and bang (into Joseph). Easy for me is blow the whistle, yeah, you’ve got control.
JB: Again, can I just say add one more thing to that, I mean, we just spoke off air and, my problem with this is the Premier League obviously in England is the highest league. It’s the best players there, the best referees are there, and I feel like the further you go down, the threshold of what is a foul and what’s physical and what’s not gets lower and lower.
JB: I’ve played in the Championship, I’ve played in the Premier League. Some of these championship challenges like that, the reason why he didn’t give a free kick is cos he might be thinking, I’m not gonna assume, but, it’s the Championship, we see challenges like that every week, but ultimately I think the threshold should be from the Premier League, that’s what the precedent is, and then it filters down through the leagues. I think the way it is, and due to the quality of players, it filters up almost to make things equal sometimes.
JB: When you see a Premier League match against a lower division team, how they make that more equal is by being more physical and maybe working harder, that’s how you kind of summise up a closer game. Otherwise, it’s not going to be, but I just think the threshold from what the Premier League is should be filtered all the way down.
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