Olegario in deep waters...
The faulty foul detection
Many referees have a policy for what they will whistle and for what they will get out a card. Olegario Benquerenca is different in many ways: He is not predictable as such and will always decide what he feels is appropriate in this situation in this instant, but he will almost surely act differently in comparable situations. This gives his style a certain clumsyness and with his excessive hand waving plus whistling an almost frantic fuzzyness. On a good day, circumstantial factors may contribute that he will get the big calls right, on a bad day it will end on the road to hell. Today, he started fuzzy, but got better and got the big last call right.
What he did well...
He tried to communicate clearly and to talk to players before they acted foolishly. He had a quite convincing positional play on the whole and most of his cards were okay. He also tried to calm down when it was necessary and was aware what he needed to do. But due to his circumstantial decision-making, the good things didn't have the same effect as they would with a referee with a more composed foul detection. If you get the bread-and-butter-stuff right, the rest is easier. He was in good physical shape and seems to have good eyesight, but some of his decisions tend to puzzle me. He resited to the temptation to give a soft penalty to Boateng after avery brief kit pulling in the box when he went down like a cut off X-mas tree. Also good not to award a penalty in extra time when Uruguay called for one. The big call was spot on when he sent off Suarez after handling the ball on the line in the closing stages of extra time.
Where I find it difficult...
Some of the calls expecially in the first half just seemed a bit odd to me: No foul for a few clumsy challanges, then a mini-push and Benquerenca displaying a foul wave-and-whistle-choreography as if it was the "foul of the month". He got better in the second half and I have to say that he rose to the occasion in the final stages of the match. What a nasty way to shoot the deceisive penalty (Panenka style)...