Howard Webb

[pea]

All the decisions right? Come on Ian. Griffin hugging Chopra was a stone wall penalty. And the others - well you couldn't really argue if Webb had given them.

Sorry The Griff one is not a stonewaller otherwise we have ten pens per game..the first one on Chopra was nothing like a penalty and the hands was as Z turned with his hands down (and ball rebounded from one arm to the other) therefore no pen.....but he could just as easily have overlooked ours even though it was a clear pen (and the culprit knew it).

But anyway he could have been influnced by the crowd on those so yes a superb display and Cardiff had two very big (and wrong) calls in the league games which cost us four points.

Blinkers. I don't support either Reading or Cardiff, so it's a neutral view. Griffin's arms were all over Chopra at that corner, it was a foul and it was inside the box - which is a penalty. As said - the others were debatable. If they were given you could see why. A slight nudge on Olifinjana, the other Chopra incident and Zurab's handball.

If any of those were given it would have been a complete joke, never ever penalties, but Griffin was lucky with the other one as it could have been given if the cross was closer to Chopra.

[Ian Royal]

Fed's handball was handball and we got away with it. The other "handballs" weren't.

Griffin feeling up Chopra's manboobs was the sort of challenge that never gets given unless they're going for the ball.

The clash with Olofinjana was marginal but I thought correct.

Olifinjana I thought was a nailed on penalty on first view, but on repeated viewings the ball seems to be dropping behind him so he'd have struggled to get much on it and the contact was minimal.

Personally I don't think you can give handball for having your arms tucked into your chest when you're looking to go through a small space between two players. I cannot see what else he could have done with them. If he sticks them above his head and Bothroyd gets there first and tips it over him then it's a definite handball and probable red if it hits his arms.

[Bandini]

Fed - didn't the ball hit his right hand/fist when his hand was by his side? Looked like he controlled it to me.

[Ian Royal]

Fed - didn't the ball hit his right hand/fist when his hand was by his side? Looked like he controlled it to me.

Looked to me it was tucked in infront of him between sternum and navel height and hit him on the arm in the centre of his mass. But I was pissed at the (many) time(s) I saw it.

EDIT: thought it hit his left arm, you were right, hit his right but it was down by his side and not intentional, he's not looking at it.


I think Webb got them all about right, but it would be impossible to complain if he'd given the Griffin hold or Legs nudge.

[The Cube]

In the first leg, Mills was fouled at every corner we had (similar to the second leg penalty incident) - Sky chose not to refer to this at any stage on Friday, but as soon as it's Griffin on Chopra it is somehow a big incident worthy of conspiracy theory.

The Liegertwood push was probably a penalty, but immediately before that Chopra dived to ground in an attempt to con a penalty. Had the referee seen everything it would have been a free kick to us and a yellow card to Chopra. I like to think that Webb was distracted by the cheating.

Federici's was definitely handball, but it would only have been a yellow card plus a free kick so hardly a game-changer. Quite apart from the covering defenders, the forward has to be in control of the ball for it to count as denying a goal-scoring opportunity, whilst in this case the forward hadn't even touched it.