World Cup final referee Szymon Marciniak hits back at 2/10 L’Equipe rating and 200,000-signature petition with phone footage showing “this is not serious business”. The Polish official, who officiated in Argentina’s win over France and seemingly got all the big calls right, including the awarding of three penalties, was largely applauded for his display. However, some questions were raised over Marciniak’s control of the shoot-out with Argentina’s Emi Martinez receiving a booking for distraction tactics, but in France they focused on another incident. Media outlet L’Equipe – notorious for their harsh match ratings – only gave Kylian Mbappe a 9/10 despite him becoming only the second player to score a World Cup final hat-trick. Perhaps harsher than that, though, was Marciniak getting a 2/10, while a petition to replay the final has received over 200,000 signatures. After the match, L’Equipe posted a photo of Lionel Messi’s goal that made it 3-2 goal in extra-time, claiming Argentina players were already on the pitch celebrating. “According to the regulations, Messi’s second goal, in extra time, should have been disallowed by the match referee, Szymon Marciniak,” they wrote. “Argentinian substitutes were already on the pitch before the ball went over the goal line of Hugo Lloris.”
Marciniak had the perfect response while discussing the game back in Poland, whipping out his phone to show the France bench on the pitch for one of Mbappe’s goals. “The French have not said anything about these photos, where you can see that there were seven French players on the field before Mbappe scored,” he said. “The game was never affected. How much impact did the players who came onto the field have? It’s looking for little things. This is not serious business.”
The referee also revealed that while the French media and fans might be angry with him, the players certainly weren’t. “The French thanked me after the game and were satisfied with our performance,” he said. “Everyone came up to us and shook our hands. I talked a little bit with Hugo Lloris and Olivier Giroud. Kylian Mbappe even gave me a hug. He was very disappointed by the loss. I think it was a human response. I also hugged him and tried to comfort him.”
Marciniak also went into detail about retired Pierluigi Collina, considered the best ever referee, visiting him in the changing room after. “Collina knew he was always my idol. After this final he told me: now you are my idol. It was the best thing I could hear. You know how it is. We don’t have complexes that we are from Poland, but when we started our international career, we ended up in the third category of referees. Others, who were in the second category, had much better matches and refereed at the highest level, but somehow we ended up here in the World Cup final.”
Source: TalkSport