02 URUFRA Nishimura

 

What a tough game for Yūichi Nishimura! If the opener played hours earlier was two teams hyperactive on a sugar high, Uruguay - France was two wily punch-drunkards going at each other for twelve rounds. 

Certainly a tough one for the Japanese referee who had to do everything to tread water, but at the end he had quite remarkably survived. This game would have sunk many, but not Nishimura, who pluckily got himself through - and recommended himself for higher tasks later on.

Let's look then at how Yūichi Nishimura solved this very challenging match.

Analysis

Setting a stall out

Nishimura started the game with a very tight approach. To be honest I had the impression he was a bit anxious, and decided he would rather blow up for offences when in doubt rather than let them go, which led to some decisions which surprised the players (8', 18').

He also strongly acted against tactical holding fouls. Cautions at 12' and 19' are good classroom cases that field position isn't everything when determining if a foul stopped a promising attack. Having already committed a holding offence at 4', Patrice Evra's caution especially was a great call. 

Nishimura had succeeded with his plan for the opening minutes.

Laissez-faire?

Then, mid-way through the first half - Nishimura totally changed his tactic! Presumably having suffocated the game sufficiently, he decided to let a little more air into it; he started ignoring not only offences he would have blown up for in the opening period of the match, but also a few clear fouls too. I can't really work out why though. 

A really interesting incident happens at 36:58 - is that not a clear DOGSO handling by William Gallas!? Nishimura whistles a (phantom?) freekick for France, Uruguay players don't seem too bothered about it either - did I miss something there? Luis Suárez would have been flagged offside by AR Tōru Sagara, in 2010 that was an active offside. 

Diego Pérez should really have been cautioned for a reckless kick at 39', which would have offered a chance to balance the cards too, but Nishimura only awarded a freekick.

The end of the first half was weird - almost no flow at all, typically reminiscent of the end of a second half. A warning shot for what might come.

Rising tension

The players now were getting more and more anxious, not really through Nishimura's fault. He did miss a reckless striking offence at 51', and didn't caution Jérémy Toulalon (this would become relevant later) for a clear SPA holding foul at 55' - stopping more promising attacks than those in the first half!

When Mauricio Victorino slid in late, in an arguably even careless manner at 59', there was no way that Nishimura wasn't going to pull out a balancing card. Japanese referee increased his presence to twice punish offences on Suárez (49', 62').

There was no way of calming the players at that point - but Nishimura to his credit did try. Patrice Evra was actually pretty fortunate not to have been sent off at 64' (referee was totally right not to), and a caution for Nicolás Lodeiro - later crucial - for petulantly throwing the ball away was an attempt to gain a firmer grip on proceedings.

Toulalon in late

By now, the players were ready to explode. at 68', when Jérémy Toulalon's sliding foul did not successfully bring down his counter-attacking opponent, the France player while prostrate decided to unceremoniously put his arm out to do the trick.

Uruguay players were furious. Nishimura didn't really sense the moment here. He blew a couple of seconds late, either waiting to see if the counter-attack could continue or simply missed the foul and was informed by a teammate. Toulalon was correctly cautioned, his foul cynical though it was, never merited anything more.

France coach Raymond Domenech then bizarrely entered the field of play to try and calm Toulalon down. When fourth official Joel Aguilar and Nishimura persuaded him to leave (and really he should have been ejected; you can't just run on the pitch), and having successfully restored order, Nishimura called Toulalon over.

Nishimura showed his top class in two ways here:

1) sensing that the game and the players needed further calming, and the time taken by this chat would assist in doing so.

2) he actually managed to connect with the France player; at the end, Toulalon gave Nishimura a look of respect - great testament to the Japanese referee's soft skills!


Crazy, but preventable

By ten minutes from the end, everyone was starting to get a little bit tetchy again. A sequence starting from a France throw-in at 81' gave Nishimura ample opportunity to blow up for a calming freekick, but neither he nor well-placed Tōru Sagara could find one.

Already cautioned Nicolás Lodeiro did not heed any caution when seconds later he needlessly flew in to a tackle on the near side. Nishimura did see this one coming and was straight over with a yellow card. Somewhat testament to how mentally draining this game was, he couldn't instantly remember he had already cautioned Lodeiro, at 65'.

Nishimura's presence remained remarkably calm. He checked his notes and pulled out the red card from his notebook, not from his back pocket where his red card normally resided. Lodeiro was off.

Replays showed how dangerous the tackle was, actually, a clear case of Serious Foul Play for which Lodeiro should have been shown a straight red card (crucial mistake). Between Nishimura, Sagara and Aguilar, the referees team should really have come to the right conclusion.

In the grand scheme it didn't really matter as Lodeiro walked anyway; it is interesting to speculate what would have happened if the Uruguay player hadn't already been booked, and had survived after that challenge.

Playing for time

Nishimura was understandably a bit exhausted by this point. A good case-in-point is the very poor advantage he played at 86'.

France screamed for a penalty at 90'. One hopes the irony of Thierry Henry, the target of many a camera shot even before he came on as a substitute, being the chief protagonist in doing so was not lost on him. It seems the referee has a zero angle and I am not really sure how well Nishimura could have assessed it - in any case he was right. Mauricio Victorino's arm was tucked right into his body.

Japanese referee correctly penalised a not-that-dangerous scissors tackle by Diego Lugano not that far out from the France goal at +92'. Uruguay players passively mobbed Nishimura after the call, to which he responded dismissively. By now he was, understandably, playing for time.

Then a petty argument ensued over the blade of grass from which the kick should be taken. Two Uruguay players refused to retreat - to be honest, the best way to solve this was to shout at them to "f*** off", but Nishimura chose not to do that. Instead he pulled Lugano out and booked him. To be fair to the referee - I doubt he had much gas left in the tank to do anything else having been severely tested for ninety-plus minutes.

Freekick kicked into the wall and then time was up - Nishimura had done it, fulltime. Remembered as a dire and boring game, it was anything but with a focus on the refereeing. 

Balance

Not perfect, but how Yūichi Nishimura successfully handled this nightmare game was simply very impressive. All of his tactical choices eventually payed off, and if the only real blemish on you from this game is that the second yellow should have been a straight red, you did pretty well. Nishimura showed to be an extremely valuable man for FIFA, especially for not being from Europe or South America, and his tournament promised a lot after this first game.

Due to the nature of the match, very little for Tōru Sagara from Japan nor Korean Jeong Hae-sang to do in terms of computing offsides. Expected level for both assistants. 

Yūichi Nishimura - 7,9(3) Tōru Sagara - 8,4 Jeong Hae-sang - 8,4 Joel Aguilar William Torres JPN, JPN, KOR – SLV	Uruguay 0-0 France Group Stage 11 June
Victorino (59') - Tackle Lodeiro (65') - Delaying the Restart  Lugano (+93') - Delaying the Restart	Evra (12') - SPA (Holding) Ribéry (19') - SPA (Holding) Toulalan (68') - Tackle
Lodeiro (81') - Tackle