Arsenal lose final...

[gameboy]

Arsenal 1-0 Barcelona - at half time.

Arsenal down to 10 men with goalkeeper sent off...

Com'on the gunners...

 

[rolfw]

Looks like they are going to struggle to keep the lead though. Not doing badly considering the one man deficit.

 

[gameboy]

1-1

Keep the nerve...

 

[gameboy]

Barca go 2 - 1 ahead with less than 15 mins to go.

Henrik Larsson 'on' and involved in both goals - quality player.

 

[gameboy]

Barcelona win 2- 1 after a great game.

The best team in Europe.

 

[Topper]

Blow the assistant refs being biased as mentioned on the radio news, the ref was truly awful, Arsenal were playing 10men against 12.

Robbed in my opinion:mad:

 

[Salty25]

Totally agree. A combination of extremely poor refereeing, the illogical sending off of Lehmann and the subsequent loss of Pires and a substitution, and added on tim 2 minutes less than was required due to stoppages, made Arsenal's task almost impossible, even with Ronaldinho having a horror night.

The Arsenal defense should, however, be honoured for holding out for so long, especially Campell, Eboue, and Toure.

 

[jimbo]

Yep, the game was far too big for the referee. This was a major show piece in the football calendar and he bottled everything. 'O'-red

The best part of the match was Henry's interview afterwards.

 

[Leee]

Henry was bang on the money with his comments. The ref .... shocking. **** it, think about it and give the goal, leave Lehmann on and let the final pan out the way it could've.

:-bash :-bash :-bash did the ref borrow his linesmans Barca shirt for the night?

 

[BadWithComputer]

The referre was fine in my opinion, I was a neutral last night. Leymann was sent off for fouling Eto. The referre played advantage and Barca scored. But he decided to call it back (Rightfully in my opinion) and send off Leymann, Come on guys, he grabbed his ankle!

 

[rolfw]

Don't think it is purely that incident which everyone is talking about, but regarding that, it could have gone either way and the referee chose to not play the advantage, if Barca had gone on to lose, their fans would have been moaning about that decision.

 

[Leee]

how did he play advantage? The goal would've stood and that, IMO, was punishment enough even though technically he was possibly correct in what he actually did, he failed to let the game flow and actually imposed himself too much on the game.

My issue with the RED card is that Lehmann did not deny a goalsoring chance, so it was a foul not a professional foul.

Collina, for example, would've let the goal stand and may (or may not) have given a yellow to the 'keeper.

Henry was quite right in his summary of how much the central defenders got away with - the Mexican ponytail bloke clearly went through Henry yet no foul was given.

I say the team with 11 men won. Nothing more, nothing less.

And it's no coincidence that this ref won't be in Germany this summer ;)

 

[Leee]

this is funny though, just came across it:

 

[T_G]

Well, I have to agree with the neutrals point of view, I watched the game together with a German guy and we both agreed that the Lehman foul was a red card. Ref had no choice. Also, I don't think the rev was too much biased to any side.

Also noted by neutrals: As ALWAYS when the Arseanal lose, they whinge and blame everybody but themselves. The linesman, the ref, blablabla.
I did not hear anything like: "Yeah, Barca had one man more, and that made it difficult. We did our best but towards the end we were nacked. Of course, if our stupid keeper did not have one of his red mist moments, maybe we could have gotten something out of it later on". But noooooo, not from the honourably Henry "Houdini".

Whinging about Puyol, but what about all those tackles from that little t*** Cole? Forgot that as well...He might be a good player, but the difference between him and the other teams captain is that one went missing and choked as so many times befor where the other didn't...

Anyway, I think the better team won, and most neutrals think this as well.

 

[Salty25]

Well, I have to agree with the neutrals point of view, I watched the game together with a German guy and we both agreed that the Lehman foul was a red card. Ref had no choice. Also, I don't think the rev was too much biased to any side.

Also noted by neutrals: As ALWAYS when the Arseanal lose, they whinge and blame everybody but themselves. The linesman, the ref, blablabla.
I did not hear anything like: "Yeah, Barca had one man more, and that made it difficult. We did our best but towards the end we were nacked. Of course, if our stupid keeper did not have one of his red mist moments, maybe we could have gotten something out of it later on". But noooooo, not from the honourably Henry "Houdini".

Whinging about Puyol, but what about all those tackles from that little t*** Cole? Forgot that as well...He might be a good player, but the difference between him and the other teams captain is that one went missing and the other one choked as so many times before...

Anyway, I think the better team won, and most neutrals think this as well.

Theres no doubt that the best team won, i dont think anyone could argue with that, and the Lehmann incident is down to a matter of opinion about what was best for the game. However, the majority of not just Arsenal fans, but also neutral, I think will argue that the ref was extremely naive and inept in much of his decision making. It would have been better to have a Dutch or Italian ref, at least they are better at telling when players are 'simulating'.

At the end of the day, Barca didnt need poor refereeing to help them, they had the talent to win it anyway. Its a shame both Henry and Ronaldinho has off night... I guess England, Germany, and Italy as well as the other favourites should take some hope from that. Can't believe Giuly didn't even make the reserves for France, apart from Larsson, he was the best player last night, and you could say the same for Victor Valdas (who went up in my previously low estimation of him).

 

[Salty25]

Now the ref has admitted he was harsh - http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/football/europe/4993994.stm

 

[jimbo]

Anyway, I think the better team won, and most neutrals think this as well.

I don't agree with that at all. I'm not saying Arsenal are better but their team was not on show from the 18th minute onwards. So in fact we won't know which was the better team. It's not about what you do during the season, it's what you do in that one match.


As far as the sending off was concerned this is from the the referees own rules, laws and regulations under 'Powers and Duties':

(The referee) allows play to continue when the team against which an offence has been committed will benefit from such an advantage and penalises the original offence if the anticipated advantage does not ensue at that time

Even last night's ref has admitted he should have waited a couple of seconds. He would then have allowed the goal and given the keeper a yellow card.

 

[jimbo]

Obviously Septic Bloater is a member on here and read my last post.

 

[john_graydon]

Was watching this match in a bar in Puerto Rico last wed. I was the only one in the pub up for Arsenal. You might think you were in a pub full of Spanish but I wasnt..It was full of British. Whats the story I asked one guy after the match. He said everyone in the pub backed Barca...I said fair kop excuse the pun. I think the match was ruined with Lehmann sent off. Who knows.

 

[Salty25]

Obviously Septic Bloater is a member on here and read my last post.

But who? If I'm Bernie Ecclestone, Sepp has to be on here somewhere!