| With
most of the country's top villains locked away this week (figuratively speaking
that is), things were mighty quiet this weekend. There was no Juanfran,
Samways, Téllez and company, all serving suspensions, and it took some
creative refereeing by Daudén Ibáñez even to produce a
couple of red cards. He produced the only two scarlets of the day, both to
Villarreal players in their match at Mallorca. To be fair to Daudén, the
first red was fairly clear, Quique Alvarez doing a very good impersonation of
Chopper Harris with two scything tackles in five minutes late in the first
half, the second of which on Engonga would have felled a great redwood. The
second red card was less clear though, Galván losing his cool with
linesman Martín Nieto for disallowing a penalty (see white stick section
for more), and calling the official a goat. Well maybe he added an 'n' at the
end of word, which is a bit stronger in Spanish, but whatever the case
Martín Nieto reported this to the referee and he produced the red
directly. Incidentally for those of you who speak a bit of Spanish and want to
learn some more colourful language, we can recommend the referees reports which
are now published fully in the official federation website futvol.com under the
heading 'actas'. It's all there in black and white. Makes Fanny Hill look quite
tame at times. Just for the record, Urrutia's yellow card from last week was
cancelled by the appeal committee as they agreed it was a case of mistaken
identity, and his one match suspension was therefore not applied. Arzeno moved
level second after picking up another yellow, and Manel and Urzaiz joined the
group on six points, the Bilbao striker missing the next game after getting his
fifth yellow of the season. (27.11.00) |
