“Such judging is unacceptable,” — referee expert on the work of Denis Shurman

In the 14th round of the Ukrainian championship, the match “Rukh” — “Left Bank” took place, which ended with a victory for the Lviv team with a score of 1:0. After the match, the coach of Kyiv, Vitaliy Pervak, was outraged by the refereeing, saying: “It’s already tiresome that we are constantly having our heads ripped off.” The issue was the penalty kick that Kyiv player Denis Shurman awarded against the guests. This penalty decided the fate of the match.

Sergey Shebek

Was there a mistake in that episode, as explained by expert, former FIFA referee Sergey Shebek:

— One can agree with the guests’ coach that there was not even close to a penalty. And this is a serious mistake not only by the on-field referee Shurman, but also by VAR referee Anastasia Romanyuk. If Shurman had good vision, he would surely have seen that the Kyiv player Yakymyv cleanly kicked the ball, and Didyk simply fell over the defending player’s leg. The referee must clearly see where the ball flew after the kick — from the foot of the one kicking, from the penalty area, and not towards the goal during the attacking player’s movement.

If Didyk had played the ball first, the round object would have moved towards the goal. But everything happened the other way around. And this is the main criterion in assessing the episode.

But why is Romanyuk also having vision issues? After all, she was watching Didyk’s fall under comfortable conditions. And instead of calling Shurman to review the illegitimate decision, insisting on noting the unfair penalty, she convinced the referee that he acted correctly. Absurd! And now think, did Shurman and Romanyuk together deliberately “rip off the head” of Pervak’s team, or is this an unfortunate coincidence, and it can be considered a banal mistake. Oh yes, there is a lie detector, where both can answer a rhetorical question.

— Such judging is unacceptable. I would like to repeat my words addressed to Shurman after the cup match “Shakhtar” — “Zarya,” where he also messed up: Shurman is a very weak referee who does not understand the essence of football, does not deal with confrontations, which is important for a referee. He has constant mistakes and problems every year in the championship. This is the kind of FIFA referees we have. And this game once again confirmed my opinion.