Olympics 2012, in Londontown

http://www.ctvolympics.ca/field-sports/news/article/game-over-for-controversial-women-soccer-referee.html?cid=rsstsn

Christina Pedersen will not ref the Gold or Bronze game. For good reason, imo.

 

Late to the game here but just want to point out after I had my ACL replacement, my MT would put this on my knee during the second half of my daily sessions -- and there was a very noticeable affect. You could feel the blood being pulled to the surface of the skin. It was a weird sensation, but it did ease the pain no doubt.

Not sure if it works for every injury everywhere, but I know some procyclists and they swear by it on their hammies. They also swear by their Breathe-Right strips on their noses, too.

The magnetic bracelets? Those are bullshit.

 

Do Olympic semifinal officials usually take medal-round games? I know at World Cups, if you ref a semi, that's it. You're done.

 

The U.S.-Canada game would've posed a challenge to any official as both teams are, frankly, dirty as hell. However, the ref was utterly unable to meet the challenge and made matters worse. Were I coaching the U.S. team, I'd warn them until I was out of breath to be very careful in the final, as my suspicion is yellow cards will flutter down like confetti at the end of the Super Bowl.

 

Honestly, when was the last time you saw yellow cards flutter at a women's soccer game? I covered a Division I team one season, and I saw two yellow cards all season. Two. It wasn't because the games weren't physical.

One game, the team I covered had a girl having her shirt grabbed from behind while on a midfield run. Ref didn't call a foul even after the girl with the ball stumbled a bit and lost the ball. Only when the girl who lost the ball turned around and bitch-slapped the other player was a foul called on the defensive player. No card issued to the girl who issued the bitch-slap.

 

Lithuania have a good solid team, not really surprising that they're only trailing Russia by four points.

 

Looks like Russia will do enough to advance to the semis. Up nine with under 4 minutes left.

 

I got Brazil over Argentina, US over Australia, Spain over France and Lithuania over Russia in the men's basketball quarterfinals.

 

McKayla is not impressed.

http://mckaylaisnotimpressed.tumblr.com/

 

Funny...but mean. She's like, what...17? Leave the poor girl alone.