DFB-Pokal: It’s only Wolfsburg to blame, not the referee – sport


In his statement, Mark van Bommel tries to use humor. When the sports court of the German Football Association (DFB) asked the VfL Wolfsburg coach whether he had only spoken to the fourth official once, he replied: “No, I talk a lot.” And when the trio of judges told him a little later that, according to his testimony, he had now been dismissed, he quickly replied: Dismissed? But only from here? And not as head coach?

Van Bommel, 44, had his experience with the sports court during his active time at FC Bayern. There is a nice anecdote about how he later met a representative of the committee and said: “I have always been innocent.” This thesis is unlikely to find approval in the football world – and in the case that van Bommel had to visit the DFB on Monday, he and his club were found guilty again.

Because van Bommel had substituted six instead of the allowed five players in the first round of the DFB Cup against regional league Preußen Münster on August 8 (3-1 after extra time), the chamber rated the game as a 2-0 defeat for Wolfsburg. This would mean that VfL would be eliminated from the cup, but they can still appeal this decision to the DFB Federal Court. The presiding judge Stephan Oberholz said in the grounds of the judgment that the committee had no other choice. With the sixth change, VfL used a player who was not eligible to play and thus violated the regulations – and the responsibility for this violation lies with the club.

Is it only the club to blame or is it also the fourth official?

The formal key data looked like this on that cup day in Münster: VfL made three changes in regular time, in the final minute of which Wolfsburg managed to equalize. In the 98th minute van Bommel exchanged a fourth player, in the 102nd he made a double substitution – only then did the favorite score two more goals for a 3-1 victory.

The second part of this double change, however, was no longer allowed, and now the court discussed the question of who was to blame for what happened: only the club, or also the fourth official? Because Wolfsburg argued in particular that the referee had allowed the sixth change – and that he had allegedly explained several times in advance to those responsible at VfL that six changes were in order.

Since Corona, the number of changes in football has fundamentally increased, but this is handled somewhat differently from competition to competition. For example, at the European Championships, five changes are possible in the regular season and an additional sixth in the event of overtime. In the DFB-Pokal, on the other hand, there are a maximum of five, there is only one additional “substitution window” during overtime, within which a coach can change. This is what the rules say, and this is how the DFB informed all cup participants again in an email shortly before the competition. “The association was aware of the relevant regulations right from the start,” said Oberholz, and an association like Wolfsburg must “be able to ensure that such regulations and provisions are adhered to”.

The referee on the sidelines and the VfL representatives provide different information about the content of their conversation

But surprisingly, this information was not clear on the Wolfsburg coaching bench during the cup game against Münster. At the beginning of the extension, VfL officials asked Fourth Official Tobias Fritsch several times about the number of possible changes; twice goalkeeping coach Pascal Formann, once van Bommel personally. They asked Fritsch specifically whether they still had three substitution windows and three substitutions available, and Fritsch replied in the affirmative. Assistant referee Fritsch, however, denies that he said so. He only said that the club still had three replacement windows – but only two options.

Regardless of the information, there was a second reason about Fritsch’s role. Because the referee team around Christian Dingert allowed the momentous Wolfsburg double substitution. The former Bundesliga referee and today’s DFB instructor Lutz Wagner, 58, as the invited expert, clearly stated that one of the duties of the fourth official was to check the admissibility of a change and to report any violations to the respective club. In his questioning, Fritsch stated that at the moment of the double change in the 102nd minute he was not aware that the sixth change was pending; he wanted to settle the procedure quickly because a corner kick should be taken.

Judge Oberholz stated, however, that the failure to check the referee was secondary. “We see the initial error of VfL Wolfsburg as so serious that a possible contributory negligence of the fourth official is behind it,” he said.

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