MLS rightfully restored Serna, but the reasoning raises questions.

By Robert Wagman
SoccerTimes

WASHINGTON, D.C. (Thursday, October 18, 2001) -- Just the other day, I told a friend there was very little Major League Soccer could do that would surprise me. The words were barely out of my mouth when down comes the Diego Serna red-card decision. It surprised me on several levels; MLS has displayed a special talent of, even when making the right decision, sticking a foot in its mouth.

A quick recap. On Sunday, in the second match Miami Fusion-San Jose Earthquakes playoff semifinal series, the Fusion’s Serna and San Jose’s Zak Ibsen became tangled up going after a 50-50 ball. Both fell, with Serna landing heavily on Ibsen. As the two lay on the ground, Ibsen kicked at Serna, making contact. It was not a vicious kick, but referee Ricardo Valenzuela, fondly known as "Red Card Richard" to many around the league, did not hesitate to showing red to Ibsen.

Valenzuela was then called over by the fourth official, Tim Weyland, and after a discusssion, Valenzuela ejected Serna also. The television replays showing Serna did nothing to deserve a red, and probably nothing to deserve any kind of card at all, were so clear that even the San Jose broadcast crew were incredulous.

I have not doubt whatsoever that the MLS disciplinary committee did the right thing in reversing the decision, but its reasoning, which was explained in 346 words, was so belabored, that right decision was made for all the wrong reasons.

The simple explanation would have been that Valenzuela and Weyland botched matters, the error of their ways made crystal clear by the video tape. The only fair thing to do was nullify the red card and its automatic one-game suspension, allowing Serna to play in last night’s deciding third match.

That, however, would have meant the unthinkable: using the videotape to review and change a referee’s decision. That would open a Pandora’s box hard to contemplate, where every referee’s decision in the future would be open to appeal and reversal. The league’s absolute policy is that a referee’s on-the-spot decision is not subject to review unless for something extraordinary such as the misidentification of a player.

"We’ve always had the policy of not substituting a judgment made by a videotape from people a few thousand miles away for the judgment of officials on the spot." MLS deputy commissioner Ivan Gazidis said.

So a way had to be found to do the right thing while still upholding the referees and not seeming to be using television replay.

So here’s what they came up with: a failure of communication between Weyland and Valenzuela. We are asked to believe that Weyland called Valenzuela over and told him that he must have missed seeing Serna commit a foul deserving of a caution. Valenzuela, we are told, misunderstood or misinterpreted what Weyland was telling him and he showed red instead of yellow. Weyland in turn, so says MLS, thought Valenzuela was using his discretion in issuing red.

As the league put it, "The referee has since confirmed that he did not exercise any independent judgment on the issue of Serna's card, but relied upon what he understood the fourth official to have told him." Weyland, apparently when asked if he told Valenzuela to eject Serna, said in effect, "Who, me?"

So, again to quote MLS’s official statement: "The MLS disciplinary committee has concluded such an error in communication is more akin to an error in identification than to an error in judgment by the officials, and therefore warrants extraordinary action."

Yeah, right.

Then there are times the league does the wrong thing for all the right reasons. Three years ago, the Chicago Fire, with about 10 days to prepare after advancing, won an MLS Cup championship in Los Angeles over D.C. United with only three days of rest from its final semifinal match. It was obvious that United was at a tremendous disadvantage and the league vowed that in the future participants in MLS Cup would have a week’s rest before the final showdown.

But here we go with San Jose meeting Los Angeles in Columbus, Ohio, Sunday, with both teams having only three full days between their final semifinal matches and MLS Cup. Playing four matches in 11 days has to adversely affect both teams.

This time fate intervened. MLS rightly decided not to play any matches the weekend the United States played Jamaica in a critical World Cup qualifier. The terrorist attack of September 11 caused a four-day delay and when the semifinals each went the maximum three matches, MLS Cup wound up a match between two exhausted, banged up teams.

"It's a lot asking the players in the most intense games to play four games in (11) days," Galaxy coach Sigi Schmid said. "It's also asking a lot of top caliber athletes to bring a performance that often. It's the reality of the situation and something we have to deal with. Is it ideal? No. Hopefully in the future we'll be able to avoid the situation. But this year it was something that was not avoidable and for the good of soccer, I believe the right decisions were made."

Said Gazidis, "If you had asked us in early September how we had our playoff schedule planned out, we would have had Game 3 planned for the past weekend so you would have had a full week of rest and recuperation."

The last 15 minutes of regulation and the overtime of the Galaxy-Chicago Fire third semifinal match provided the most exciting MLS soccer I have seen in years. It is tragic that the only ones who saw it were 13,444 at Chicago’s Soldier Field, a television audience in Los Angeles, those with MLS pay-per-view satellite packages on DirecTV or Dish TV, or a crazy few at sports bars who showed the match.

ESPN2 was showing a 24-year-old NFL game, a sad programming choice.

Senior correspondent Robert Wagman's "It Seems To Me . . . " appears regularly on SoccerTimes. He can be e-mailed at bobwagman@soccertimes.com..