Yesterday evening's dramatic game between Russia and Denmark handled by Clément Turpin gave us the most widely discussed performance of UEFA EURO 2020 so far. This post takes a close look at how the Frenchman got on in a remarkable tie.
A separate post will take a look at the other three games on Day Eleven of the tournament; this post specifically focuses on the Russia - Denmark match. Unfortunately, my conclusion is that Clément Turpin failed the test in this match, and that UEFA have no option but to reject this performance. My post analyses why.
We will start with the two crucial incidents of the evening, the potential second yellow card to Russia no.13 (65') and the penalty given to Russia (68'). You can view a video montage of the two scenes below.
Big Decisions
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65': I am genuinely quite surprised that the absolute consensus is that Turpin missed a crystal clear second yellow card in this scene.
I think there are three key questions that need asking to analyse this situation, before reaching a final conclusion.
Are UEFA referees advised to treat second yellow cards differently to 'first' cautions?
Yes! I quote verbatim from clip A1 of the RAP 2019:1 (ie. the most important point that UEFA wanted to make from this six months of matches) - "referees are reminded that when they administer the second yellow card, the offence must clearly and without doubt warrant such sanction".
Clément Turpin must have had this in the back of his mind - UEFA does not want second yellow cards which are avoidable.
Would Kudryashov have been shown the yellow card if not already booked?
It is impossible to answer that question conclusively, but I am actually not convinced that this foul, of itself, is a totally mandatory yellow card (regardless of first or second).
We can immediately rule out assessing this foul as an example of UEFA's interpretation of showing a lack of respect for the game - the holding is not excessive, nor prolonged.
Are UEFA referees advised to treat second yellow cards differently to 'first' cautions?
Yes! I quote verbatim from clip A1 of the RAP 2019:1 (ie. the most important point that UEFA wanted to make from this six months of matches) - "referees are reminded that when they administer the second yellow card, the offence must clearly and without doubt warrant such sanction".
Clément Turpin must have had this in the back of his mind - UEFA does not want second yellow cards which are avoidable.
Would Kudryashov have been shown the yellow card if not already booked?
It is impossible to answer that question conclusively, but I am actually not convinced that this foul, of itself, is a totally mandatory yellow card (regardless of first or second).
We can immediately rule out assessing this foul as an example of UEFA's interpretation of showing a lack of respect for the game - the holding is not excessive, nor prolonged.
I am neither convinced the foul is actually clear SPA (see here). The attacker is running very wide (right by the touchline), there are defenders who can immediately cover the free space ahead of him, and the crossing options are very limited indeed.
So personally, the theoretical arguments do not convince me that this is a clear yellow card!
Did 'football expect' Kudryashov to be shown the second yellow card?
Yes, most certainly - and that is what sinks Clément Turpin. It is understandable that normal football people don't have an intricate understanding of SPA, careless vs. reckless; for them, the instinctive second yellow card criteria essentially comes down to a key question:
"Was this a stupid action by the already-cautioned player for which he clearly risked himself getting ejected?"
And Kudryashov most certainly does act stupidly with that holding foul. Furthermore, his apology and manner after the foul does more than anything to clearly signpost to everybody that he himself actually expected to be sent off here, only to be spared by the referee.
Would anyone have really complained, been surprised if Kudryashov had been sent off?
No. I think that is the authoritative point in the final analysis.
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68': I would also argue the penalty scene is rather less cut-and-dry than most people here argued - at least in the strictly theoretical sense.
At least in the way that one assesses duels on the halfway line so to speak, I think that Vestergaard does commit a foul. The attacker wins the position by good play, takes a good touch, and only by impeding him can the defender then clear the ball away for a corner.
The attacker cannot run through 'a brick wall', he doesn't really have any other choice than to go down, not on account of the minor holding which was identified as the reason for the penalty call by everybody I've seen discuss the situation.
I am quite firm that this is not a decision with zero merit; personally, I would even praise Turpin for it! However, I'd be quite alone in that. For Turpin, for his tournament, play on would be the much better call; the wide consensus, is that the (nothing) holding was the reason for Turpin's whistle.
Again the authoritative question might be this - would Russia have really complained, even remembered the situation, if the outcome from this incident was a corner? I don't think so.
(Turpin was so blatantly mobbed after the penalty call, but he did not, or rather could not, issue any yellow card(s). It seems that the UEFA.com pre-tournament article which declares that "mobbing will be punished" was actually a typo; it is extremely obvious that they have internally instructed their referees to do exactly the opposite.
Sorry, but is not acceptable to make the referees' best option when dealing with being mobbed doing this from WC 1986. The officiating at the EURO has been very good, but we strongly disagree with this trend by UEFA - clear mobbing should always be punished with a yellow card!)
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Conclusion: The problem with these two decisions is not even that they were awful mistakes, actually I would say that isolated both are rather defendable indeed, but that Turpin lost the big picture view of them.
Turpin very visibly knew he couldn't really win in the potential SYC incident at 65' (UEFA vs. popular expectation) - he totally let the scene 'pass him by' in terms of whistle tone, presence, mimics and gestures. He looked very powerless in that moment, all-too aware of his predicament.
Ironically, the only person who took charge of this scene was Kudryashov - with his apologetic manner, he signalled to the world that Turpin ignored a 'clear' second yellow card, even if on a theoretical level (at least in my estimation), this was not such a black-white situation as is being made out.
I am quite sure that some other referees would have, ejected Kudryashov, in contravention of UEFA's vision or otherwise, because it suited them personally - and actually at no harm to themselves and their tournament.
More problematic for me is the penalty in this regard - in my eyes, Turpin even quite credibly awarded a spot kick in this scene and I am happy to explain in detail to people why (as I have above). But the problem is that he actually panicked, and answered a question that was not really being asked.
For me, the key piece of information which helps also point towards panic is no sanction - Vestergaard should have been sanctioned for this DOGSO foul (actually, according to the LotG it should be a red card because the impeding was not an attempt for the ball; more practically yellow is better despite that given current directives).
Perhaps the only person after the final whistle who would have come to the conclusion that the more theoretically correct solution was to give a penalty is writing this article, probably. That should say enough.
To sum it up, as Mark Clattenburg, referee of the last EURO final, said - the aim of the game at a major tournament is to arouse as little attention as possible in your games. In both these decisions, Clément Turpin was sunk for not keeping that maxim at the centre of his view.
Managing the Game
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Managing DtR offences was the key theme of the first forty-five minutes:
13' - Russia attacker kicks the ball away some two, three seconds after the whistle; as per this competition, Turpin just ignores it
(This should send an important message to UEFA - teams are realising what is so obvious to us, and starting to p*ss out of the game, the referees, knowing they will get away with it - this trend should be reversed in the knockout stage)
23' - less clear kicking-the-ball-away offence than 13', but as it happened for the second time, good verbal warning issued by Turpin
26' - slow taking of a Russia freekick leads to a very clear warning, again good
33' - the key scene of the first half, the first player who leaves the throw-in really had to be cautioned at this moment, it actually was perfect coherent with the referee's stepped approach until now to issue a yellow card here.
Slavko Vinčić's comparable card in the ESPSWE game suggests that the French referee did just lose this moment, as opposed to sticking ideologically the directives.
38' - minor kicking-the-ball-away, correctly ignored (for any game, not just this EURO)
-> Turpin lost it at 33'. It was very clear that delaying the game was a clear tactic of the Russia team, and he was given the perfect moment to act against it at that moment. He even set himself up for it perfectly! Denmark's goal put paid to that tactic a few minutes after 38'.
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Even with DtR management included, I found Turpin's performance pretty good for the first hour. His card choices were pretty good, I didn't have a problem with his foul detection, nor his manner, both of which were effective.
However the game began to slip away from him in the second half, for instance the missed deliberate charging foul at 48' and the simply weird chat with the Denmark coach at 50' where it seemed Turpin was listening to a lecture by him. But it was still okay until around 63'.
After that, I had the feeling that the French referee was not really in charge of the game anymore: his foul detection suffered (63', 64', 70'); his disciplinary control no longer kept the players in check (even 57', then 67', 75', 87', +91') and he became far away from some incidents (eg. 77'), having until then displayed excellent sprinting abilities.
When you include his (lack of) management at 65', with the unwise penalty call at 68' (not crucial mistakes alone, in my (exclusive?) view), this would be the first performance on my evaluation scale (link) to receive a 5 at this EURO - denoting that the referee "failed the test".
Balance
Clément Turpin visibly chose to change his approach in UEFA games in recent times, sticking much more aggressively in the background than before; at some point in the second half, he needed to revert to the 'old Turpin' from 2017-19, but the French referee couldn't bring him back when he had to.
He came out on the wrong side of a pretty lose-lose potential second yellow card scene (and showed the world how lose-lose it was, too), and had lost the thread by the time of the penalty decision. UEFA actually have no choice but to reject this performance by one of their most valuable referees; Turpin's EURO should end here.
Refereeing highlights:
Russia - Denmark
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