Good morning to all. Some bits of Monday.
Thursday’s Europa League match with PSV is reported to be in doubt, due to the availability of police officers who will be required for Queen Elizabeth’s funeral. I’ve seen a newspaper article that says up to 10,000 officers will be on duty in the days leading up to Monday, and that may affect Thursday as mourners will be able to pay their respects 24 hours a day while the Queen’s coffin lies in the condition. .
There could also be doubts about next weekend’s Premier League matches, The Times reports: Football authorities plan for as many matches to take place as possible, but club security advisory groups will make their decisions. party by party, and the key issue is around police resources.
The postponement of the PSV game would be a big problem, because it is impossible to see where it could fit in the current calendar. As it stands, Arsenal have 15 games between September 15 (Thursday) and November 12, when the football stops before the winter World Cup. There are 9 games in October, and every mid-week it’s already full. In November all 4 games have the full weekend/midweek schedule, one of which is a Europa League game and the other an EFL Cup game.
Then there is the question of sporting fairness/integrity when it comes to the other teams in the group, so a postponement on Thursday would be really problematic. Elsewhere, Rangers moved their game against Napoli from Tuesday to Wednesday and banned fans, I guess to reduce the necessary police presence. There’s no suggestion yet that PSV fans won’t be able to on Thursday if the game goes ahead, but I imagine every possible way to make it happen, including behind closed doors, will have to be considered?
I doubt they’ll go that far, but it’s quite possible that the absence of away fans makes it easier to monitor the game, so if I were a PSV fan today with tickets booked for London, I think I’d be pretty nervous. Hopefully the game can continue as normal, but it’s hard to tell at this point. A clarification, sooner rather than later, would be very welcome. As it stands, Mikel Arteta will meet with the press on Wednesday before this game, but let’s cross our fingers for more before then.
From an Arsenal perspective, there’s nothing more to report, but let’s jump a little to Italy, for some sensational Serie A VAR action.
What a business pic.twitter.com/0AC8I9koYA
— James Dart (@James_Dart) September 11, 2022
Substitute Arkadiusz Milik thought he had won the match for Juventus in added time with a fantastic header. He ran into the crowd and took off his shirt in celebration. However, having been cautioned in the 83rd minute, the referee issued a second yellow card for removing his shirt. It’s a verbatim caution and all, but hopefully the officials take the context into account, and him scoring a game-winner so late and then getting a red card seems a bit harsh.
But wait, there’s more. The VAR gets into the referee’s ear and tells him to go see. As Milik headed in, another Juventus player attempted to head the ball before he hit the back of the net. With the players milling around and tempers high, the referee took one look, declared Leonardo Bonucci offside and disallowed the goal.
Violence. More red cards, for Juan Cuadrado and Juventus coach Massimiliano Allegri. And the replays seem to suggest that Bonucci was offside, and the attempt to play the ball meant he was active in the course of the game. Mental. Except it gets worse. The replays showed the action from the penalty area, and not the Salernitana player at the bottom of the screen who was playing with everyone on the side. Ha ha.
Does #Candreva (lower left) keep everyone in the game? #Juventus #JuveSalernitana pic.twitter.com/VW5DGv2BuW
— Giovanni Albanese (@GiovaAlbanese) September 11, 2022
For us this morning, it’s wonderful entertainment, but while Juventus are a club that will never get any sympathy from me, to have a late winner wrongly ruled out and get three red cards for it is absolutely insane. Just when you think you’ve seen it all when it comes to VAR and the mess it can cause, something new appears. On the other hand, this is a technology that allows officials to see someone standing in front of an opponent and not consider it a red card.
“It’s not the technology, it’s the people who use it”, etc etc, but if they don’t have it they can’t use it! What about that?!
Well, that’s all for this morning. If there is any news or information on Thursday, we will bring it to you on Arseblog News. James and I will be recording the Arsecast Extra for you later tonight, so it’ll be late before it’s released. We’ll send out the call for questions on Twitter a little later.
Goodbye for now.
