Barcelona take football into new territory with appeal against red card to CAS

Barcelona are continuing their attempt to move football into a completely new arena for not only have they played out a game in which the activities of the referee caused even the most solid “there is nothing wrong with the referee’s so stop whinging” media to turn pale and re-consider their approach, (I think of their second match against PSG) but now they have decided to go where no one has gone before on a second front.  They are taking Neymar’s three-match ban to the Court of Arbitration for Sport after the first appeal was turned down.

Neymar got an extended suspension after being given a red card in the match against Malaga and subsequently sarcastically clapping the match officials as he left the field.

The ban, of which he has already served one game, will see him miss the so-called clasico with Real Madrid on Sunday as well as the upcoming La Liga game with Osasuna.

A statement on Barcelona’s website read: “With the Appeal Committee dismissing FC Barcelona’s appeal for the three-match suspension of Neymar Jr, the Club will appeal the decision to the Court of Arbitration for Sport CAS.

According to the referee’s report produced by Gil Manzano, Neymar received the first card for ‘not respecting the regulated distance before a free-kick, after being warned in advance’.   For the second yellow, he was sanctioned for ‘bringing down an opponent when disputing for the ball’.

Additionally the ref also wrote that Neymar ‘after being sent off and when he was heading to the tunnel, he went towards the fourth official and applauded him’.

Now if the CAS agree to hear the case and give a ruling it will take refereeing and card decisions into a new level, for it will imply that throughout Europe the decision of the referee and the appeals panel is most certainly not final, and “higher” authorities can take a look.

However the CAS normally moves very slowly and, as we saw with the appeal by Barcelona against is conviction for child trafficking (which took several months to come through) it can also result in decisions being taken in secret.  Although summaries of decisions can be given, they may not always tell us all the reasoning behind the decision.

So what happens if clubs see this happening and then go on to appeal against the referee body.  Certainly in the Premier League anything that breaks the monopoly of the PGMO in such matters would be highly welcomed.   But what happens when the player has already served his sentence by the time the appeal decision comes through? Does that then count against the next sentence, if he gets one?   Or are match results to be reconsidered?

Imagine an Arsenal player wrongly sent off in a match against Chelsea (a common enough event), and the official panel then don’t agree that there is anything to appeal.   The appeal goes to CAS who two months later give a secret ruling.   Does that mean that next time an Arsenal player is sent off he doesn’t get a punishment because the club has already suffered a wrong punishment?

Or does a player who gets sent off and immediately comes back on, so no harm is done?

Or does the League start to refuse to recognise the jurisdiction of the CAS in matters of refereeing?

It really is, for the moment, hard to see where this one is going.   But wherever it does go, it should be quite interesting to watch.

12 Replies to “Barcelona take football into new territory with appeal against red card to CAS”

  1. Nice try, Tony. However, as PGMOL is not bound by any laws other than their own (which they make up second by second), it’s highly unlikely that they would respond to ANY legal decision made against them.

  2. Got a shock the other day watching last few minutes of a game from Australia : they seem to be using video technology during live play.

    Very late in game there was a strong penalty appeal, heard someone say ‘check that for me’ while game continued; didn’t understand what I’d heard right away but commentators then made it clear it had gone to a referral and they had decided, correctly as it goes, no pen.

    Think it was during their play-offs. Surprised i hadn’t heard they were already at that stage with VAR out there. Maybe Walter or someone else has mentioned it here and i just haven’t seen it.

    Anyway, seems like good news. Only thing that can stop it now are some big incidents going wrong (and there will be some of those initially, and controversies even when well established), but even that will, I think, only delay matters.

    When it’s established in some territories that video assistance makes the game a lot more just, it will be very hard for others, even pgmol and associates, to hold out against it.

  3. The video thing lets me wonder if there should be just one ref checking the video or 3 and resulting decision is taken on a vote…..

  4. When 3 officials & the whole damned media cannot see 4 penalties in a FA cup final, what hope is there for video referral? The organisation is corrupt in its set up. It has no elected representation nor has it any random choice or even distribution of officials (that means a selected video official). It will be a visual change of an already corrupt select bunch of trained cheats. In fact they even ‘educate’ their bias into the officials prior to the match.

  5. Some of these refs in the epl and cl have made a mockery of impartiality in the game. The first was Chelsea to be hit by one underperforming ref in the cl match against Barca. The Blues shd have won the game if three penalties had been given.
    Then in Ronaldo scored 2 goals from os positions. The FA and UEFA should toughen up the punishment for these errant refs. A ten thousand euro fine will do the trick or make these guys forfeit 90% of match fee.
    Then we will really see results decided by footballers and not mo conniving with lm.

  6. Compiled 2017/Apr/24

    League table has teams at 31-34 games played out of 38.

    Team _ _ _Points _Remain Proj
    Chel$ea _ _ _ 75 _18 _ _ 89
    Spuds _ _ _ _ 71 _18 _ _ 84
    pool!!! _ _ _ 66 _12 _ _ 74
    ManC _ _ _ _ _64 _18 _ _ 76
    MoanU _ _ _ _ 63 _18 _ _ 75
    Everton _ _ _ 58 _12 _ _ 65
    Arsenal _ _ _ 57 _21 _ _ 70
    WBA _ _ _ _ _ 44 _15 _ _ 51
    Soton _ _ _ _ 40 _21 _ _ 49
    Watford _ _ _ 40 _15 _ _ 46
    Stoke _ _ _ _ 39 _12 _ _ 44
    CPalace _ _ _ 38 _15 _ _ 44
    Bournemouth _ 38 _12 _ _ 42
    StateAid _ _ _38 _12 _ _ 42
    Leicester _ _ 37 _18 _ _ 44
    Burnley _ _ _ 36 _12 _ _ 40
    Hull _ _ _ _ _33 _12 _ _ 37
    Swansea _ _ _ 31 _12 _ _ 35
    Middlesbrough 24 _15 _ _ 28
    Sunderland _ _21 _18 _ _ 25

    Projections based on extrapolating remaining games at same points rate as so far.

  7. If Middlesbrough and Sunderland win every game remaining, the most either can get is 39 points, which is typically not enough to escape relegation. If they continue on the path they’ve been on, they aren’t projected to even get to 30 points.

    It looks like the third relegation spot is a battle between Swansea and Hull, although if any team up through Stoke in 11th decide to lose every remaining game it could be interesting.

  8. If past behavior continues, Arsenal will finish in 6th, Everton being the only team we will catch. We would have one team in the 60s for points (Everton) and one team in the 50s for points (WBA), with Southampton being close. A gap of about 25 points between 6th and 10th. Did Everton, WBA and Southampton do anything special to distance themselves from the pack? Or just the luck of the draw?

    Pretty much we have a top 6 this season. I think Arsenal just had some bad luck to be in the position of being last of the six. But, we have 1 game in hand against all the other 5, except for the case of pool!!!, where we have 3 games in hand. That is potentially 9 points in hand against pool!!!, and we are 9 points behind them (and 5 worse on goal difference).

    Past performance, has us getting 13 of 21 possible points left. But, if we get those 9 points on pool!!!, we could then finish at 74 points based on past performance. Which would put 3rd to 6th spread over 3 points.

    The highest we can finish is 78 points, and the spuds are currently at 71. St. Mahgnirettot Day may come pretty soon. Which would be a bummer. But, should the spuds lose all 6 remaining games in their schedule, they could end in 6th. So, there is something to hope for.

  9. Chelsea: Home: MID, SOU, SUN, WAT Away: EVE, WBA
    Spuds: Home: ARS, MUN Away: CRY, HUL, LEI, WHU *
    pool!!!: Home: MID, SOU Away: WAT, WBA
    ManC: Home: CRY, LEI, MUN, WBA Away: MID, WAT
    MoanU: Home: CRY, SWA Away: ARS, MCI, SOU, TOT *
    ARS: Home: EVE, LEI, MUN, SUN Away: SOU, STK, TOT

    Top 6 opponents in the remaining games

    SOU 4
    CRY 3 LEI 3 MID 3 MUN 3 WAT 3 WBA 3
    ARS 2 EVE 2 SUN 2 TOT 2
    HUL 1 MCI 1 STK 1 SWA 1 WHU 1
    0: CHE LIV

    Southampton are the most important team in terms of the top 6. They have (almost) nothing to fight for, are they going to put in the effort? If they do fight, four of their remaining games are against top 6 opponents. It will be harder for them to get points.

  10. Crystal Palace, Leicester, Watford, WBA are all important, with little to fight for. About all is that they don’t want to lose their remaining games. If they were to tie all their remaining games, they are all beyond relegation.
    MoanU are in the fight at the top, and they are the most important opponent to the top 6 from the top. Moaninho has been moaning that MoanU now have too many injuries. But should they lose all 3 of those games against the top, the best they would finish with is 72 points.
    Middlesbrough will be relegated. Five games remaining with 3 of them against top 6 opponents still fighting for spots.

  11. Sunderland will be relegated. They have 6 games remaining, 2 of which are against the top 6.
    Everton have 2 games against the top 6 out of their remaining 4 games. It is very likely they will finish 7th, but perhaps Southampton could challenge them? With Southampton seeing 4 of their remaining 7 games against top 6, it isn’t likely.
    Arsenal and the spuds are opponents to other top 6 twice each in the run up.

    Hull and Swansea both have 1 remaining game against top 6 competition (Hull play spuds at home, Swansea play MoanU away). ManC is an opponent to top 6 once in the run up.

    And with no games against top 6 opponents, we have Chel$ea and pool!!!.

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