Referees "felt like normal" in season opener despite lockout
Very few moments silenced the electric crowd at Subaru Park on Saturday. Brian Gutiérrez’s rocket to open the scoring and Maren Haile-Selassie’s constant bullying of Kai Wagner were among them, but for the rest of the action, the Philadelphia atmosphere was rapturous.
That intense setting is far from ideal for anybody new to it, as was the case for first-time MLS referee Muhammad Hassan.
Hassan had only officiated six professional games prior to opening day, most of which were played in MLS Next Pro. With the context of the PSRA referee lockout, which ensures that until an agreement is reached, replacement refs must be used in MLS, an exceptional performance was not expected from Hassan. Facing high pressure and expectations, Chester seemed far from welcoming for the young American referee.
Despite all that noise, both literal and metaphorical, Hassan handled the start of the match well without much to complain about. That is until the crowd did find things to complain about. Enforcing small things but not overstepping his role within the game, everything flowed very smoothly for the first 20 minutes, but pressure began to mount as the first half stalemate continued.
During a seemingly unimportant call that did not affect the game whatsoever, Hassan was visibly hesitant when blowing the whistle following a transgression on Gastón Giménez. A few minutes later, he reasserted his responsibility on the field, much to the disapproval of the home crowd. Things grew somewhat shaky towards the end of the half following some miscommunication with his assistants. The first yellow card of the game was deservingly shown to Mauricio Pineda after an unnecessary kick-out.
“Overall I think the [referees] did a very, very good job, and that's the only thing I can say,” Fire head coach Frank Klopas said postgame. “We're happy with them. They are professionals and they did their best. I think they did a good job.”
In the second half, the “Doop song”, the Union’s famous goal song, rang through Subaru Park four times, but the game still ended 2-2. The two disallowed goals were a topic of controversy, but not for obvious reasons. The goals were both visibly offside and were correctly called back, but it was the sequence in which they were given, reviewed, and taken back that raised questions.
“I thought it was good. I didn't think you noticed that they were different quality,” midfielder Fabian Herbers said after the match. “It felt like a normal MLS game, even with two VAR decisions. The referee called it correctly from what I thought.”
Typically, when a goal is disallowed, one of two things happens. Either the goal is scored and called back instantly, following a brief delay from the sideline ref when raising the flag, or there is a slight delay caused by miscommunication between the center official and the linesmen resulting in the main official holding up the play until a decision is made.
What is rarely seen is for a goal to be celebrated like any other, for the ball to be taken back to the middle following the celebrations, and then reviewed and overturned just before the play is resumed. This happened twice in one game. With the home crowd so loud in their celebration, and with replacement referees not as familiar with VAR procedure, it was hard for Hassan to make that call in a timely manner. After the final whistle, boos rang throughout the stadium from the Union supporters.
Throughout the match, Hassan had a few hiccups, but, overall, taking the hostile environment into account, from an objective standpoint his refereeing performance was very good. Officiating around the league has been under a notable spotlight due to the lockout, and while some refs (such as those in Inter Miami’s two matches this week) did struggle to deal with the level, Hassan performed admirably potentially earning more opportunities for himself in the future.
