Shaqiri & Schlegel- A Closer Look at Potential Red Card Moments

Welcome to Instant Replay for MLS Matchday 27. I'm Andrew Weavey and we are back doing what we do best, taking a closer look at all the controversial calls in Major League Soccer. We start with a quartet in Chicago. Giorgios Koutsias is in, scoring off a beautiful pass from Brian Gutierrez. But wait, hold on, Koutsias has that little inkling of doubt, and yes, it's proven correct. VAR Daniel Radford spots the offside offense, and the referee Lucas Spala gets this right once he goes to the monitor. Look at that right knee of Koutsias ahead of the ball. Hold your run, son, and this is a good goal. In the end, it is a good offside call by the crew. Some of you hit us up and said, hey, was there violent conduct committed by Rodrigo Schlegel in the 33rd minute? Schlegel and Jadon Shaqiri are going back and forth. They're fighting for the ball and fighting for position. Schlegel gets a little bit of an elbow out there, and it catches Shaqiri in the cheek. Shaqiri needs a good corner man, gotta stop the bleeding, get that cut fixed. That looks pretty nasty, had some of you saying, oh, should that be a red card? But no, I'm with referee Lucas Spala on this one, yellow. Here's the delineation as you think about this play. Does Schlegel elbow Shaqiri? Yes, but is Schlegel trying to use his arms as a tool to create space to prevent Shaqiri from getting to the ball or as a weapon to harm Shaqiri and strike him? I think it's the former. In that case, it's going to be a yellow card as opposed to the violent conduct red card. 67th minute, another big call to make Miguel Navarro back in the lineup for Chicago. Dagger Dan, the Icelandic outside back for Orlando City, is driving in the box, and Navarro is sticking that leg in. And you can see, clear as day, this is a foul. It's inside the area. Spala points to the spot, and I completely agree with his decision. One more play from this match to complete the foursome. Rodrigo Schlegel is not happy with one yellow card. He's trying to get two, maybe even a red card for his trouble. Tensions a little bit high between these two teams. Tough foul in the area on the fire, and Schlegel's going to pick up the ball. Now, listen closely. Has his pocket picked this time too much for the referee? You heard the whistle blow, then Rodrigo Schlegel take a couple steps, look up, and fire a clearance directly into Shaqiri. Shaqiri cannot help but remember the play about half an hour ago, and give Schlegel a nice shove. Schlegel goes down. Spala wades in here. He even gets hit in the face accidentally by Gallese. And in the end, there's no second yellow or straight red card for Schlegel, and Schlegel's a lucky boy in my opinion. That could be violent conduct if you think Schlegel looked up after the whistle, spotted Shaqiri, and said, I'm firing this ball with force off him. This is a game management moment for Lucas Spala. He could give a second yellow to Schlegel. He could even go straight red, and I don't think I would argue too much. But in the end, he lets Shaqiri give the little shove. Talking two and a yellow card to Shaqiri, fair enough. And Schlegel gets the talking two as well. Hey, buddy, you're on the edge. Watch yourself for the last 15 minutes of this game. Spala kept the lid on this one, and I think it was well done from the referee. All right, how about some no-duck calls here? Columbus, Cincinnati, hell is real. And this handball is very real by Alvaro Barrial. Arm outstretched above his head. You can clearly see the ball hits the arm. That's gonna be a handball and a penalty all day, every day. Well done to the crew on that one. And well done to Nimus Aghafi and his crew on this Munsef Bakrar offside goal in the 64th minute of NYCFC Minnesota. The live view, you can't quite see where Bakrar is, just that he receives the ball and scores. But when we get that wider view, you can clearly see Bakrar did not hold his run. He's in an offside position. Good offside, no goal. And good job by the VAR Malik Badawi in the 84th minute. Julian Fernandez, the new NYCFC signing, goes down under pressure from Miguel Tapias. It kind of looks like a penalty on first glance, right? I mean, maybe. I thought it was a flop from the start, and that's what Badawi saw. Got Nimus Aghafi's ear. Aghafi goes to the monitor, and yep, no penalty here for NYCFC. Fernandez went down easy. I don't see any contact here. The contact is pretty clear, however, in the 77th minute of this play in Toronto, Montreal. Real Portretta chasing down the Montreal player and shoving him in the back. Portretta does not challenge for the ball and commits a foul in the box as the last defender, denying an obvious goal-scoring opportunity. Had he tried to play the ball, this would just be a penalty kick and not a red card. But because he doesn't, straight red, penalty kick. Montreal end up winning by one. Tough for the Reds. And a tough one for Austin and St. Louis. They lost 6-3. We go to the 60th minute mark. St. Louis defender Kyle Hebert is unwise diving in on this play. He clearly commits the foul, gets the left foot of the Austin attacker. You gotta wonder, what's he thinking here? Tim Ford, the referee, is thinking penalty and that is the right decision. But what I'm a little bit confused about in this match is in the 66th minute, Julio Cascante clearly has the ball hit his arm. Tim Ford doesn't call a penalty on the play despite St. Louis yelling and screaming, hey, that's a handball. Alejandro Mariscal is the VAR and he does not send Tim Ford to the monitor. That is just a little bit confusing to me. In my opinion, this is a handball. I know there's not much time for Cascante to react. I know he's not stopping a goal scoring opportunity. But for me, that arm is outstretched. Further than I would expect it to be for it to be in a natural position as he attempts to defend and balance himself. In the end, Mariscal must have decided, this is not a clear and obvious error. If I'm in the booth, I send it to the monitor. Let us know what you think. And last but not least, Houston, Portland, just two minutes in of a 5-0 win by the Dynamo. And the Portland Zimbers are already causing themselves issues. Claudio Bravo steps on the foot of Griffin Dorsey. Penalty all day, every day. Well done to Rami Tushan, the VAR on this one, to catch it. And let Marcos de la Vera, the referee, know the crew gets it right. This is a penalty. It's a goal for Houston, the first of five. All right, as always, if you see something, say something. We would love to hear from you, the loyal viewers of Instant Replay, when you see a potential controversial call. And remember, the job of the referee is not perfection. This is a very difficult profession, folks. And while you can have opinions on the internet, don't knock the folks doing the job unless you've tried it. All right, for my editor, Phil Livanco, and producer, Rich Hernandez, I'm Andrew Wiebe. We'll see you next time.