The controversy that occurred in San Carlos between the referee David Gomez and his assistant Victor Ramirez, led the Referees Committee to suspend both from refereeing in Costa Rica and to request Concacaf not to assign them any matches at the confederation level.
During the recent game between San Carlos and Alajuelense, referee Gomez had a discussion with his AR Ramirez, who signaled a penalty kick, but the referee refused the recommendation and left his assistant talking alone. The action came after Alexis Gamboa brought down Bryan Felix in the penalty area. The assistant raised the flag signaling for the penalty, but the referee ignored it. “The Costa Rican Football Federation expresses its concern and rejection after the unacceptable events carried out by the refereeing team this Sunday at the Carlos Ugalde Alvarez stadium in San Carlos. The referee department reported that the headsets presented some technical problems before this game and referees made the decision, on their own, not to use them. However, the referees are trained to carry out their work without the need for this equipment, and there are enough ways to communicate with each other in an effective and respectful way.” In view of what happened, the Referees Committee made the immediate decision not to appoint referee David Gomez and assistant referee Victor Ramirez for any further matches. Since both Gomez and Ramirez are on the FIFA List, the FCRF General Secretariat communicated with Concacaf and requested that this provision also applies to international matches. (Source: La Nation)
FIFA referee David Gomez is also involved in another controversy. Another FIFA referee, Keylor Herrera, filed a complaint with the Costa Rican Football Federation. He denounced four of his colleagues for defamation because they accused him of leaking private conversations between the referees. Herrera’s lawyer Antonio Cabal spoke with ESPN and informed that it is an administrative action before the Referees Committee and the Ethics Committee of the Costa Rican Football Federation (FCRF) for defamation, those accused being Herrera’s colleagues Pedro Navarro, David Gomez, Benjamin Pineda and Hugo Cruz. The actions that happened recently have led Keylor Herrera to conclude that he is being taken as a scapegoat and is being accused of having broken the trust by leaking the conversations to a journalist, which he not only ensures that it is false, but that at this point it is already beginning to affect his role as a referee in the first division of Costa Rica. In addition, on a trip to Guatemala for a Concacaf meeting, apparently one of the people who accompanied him would have heard Keylor Herrera say the name of the journalist who published the information. "The suspicion of where the gossip begins comes from a comment Keylor made on a trip to Guatemala where someone heard him alluding to a journalist's name; however, he has no connection to the journalist and that is an error of the people who are pointing it out", said his lawyer. (Source: ESPN)
