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Why Canada wasn't given a penalty after punch by Bosnia goalie to Canadian head
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- Why Canada wasn't given a penalty after punch by Bosnia goalie to Canadian head
Why Canada wasn't given a penalty after punch by Bosnia goalie to Canadian head originally appeared on The Sporting News . Add The Sporting News as a Preferred Source by clicking here .
Goalkeepers are given a lot of protections.
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Apparently, enough protection that a punch from the Bosnia and Herzegovina goalie to the head of a Canadian player in the box wasn't enough to be ruled a penalty.
It was a nasty collision, really, on a ball over the top.
Nikola Vaslij came out to play the ball, and in the end, he and Tani Oluwaseyi were both on the ground for a while.
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The referee didn't even call a foul on either player despite the massive collision.
There's certainly a case to be made.
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Why wasn't Canada given a penalty?
The ruling here is that the Bosnia keeper got the ball first, which is true.
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His punch first made contact with the ball, sending it away before his fist then hit Oluwaseyi's head.
It's a tough break for Canada, though. It doesn't feel like a punch like that is just made all clear because he hit the ball first.
A player still probably shouldn't be able to crush another player in his face.
That's how the call worked out here, though.
