Koman Coulibaly: USA Slovenia World Cup ref blasted on blogs

Koman Coulibaly moved from being the most hated man on Twitter for Friday, to the most hated man in the blogsphere.

Coulibaly, the World Cup Soccer referee, well-known in Africa before today's match pitting the USA v. Slovenia, erased from official record a goal scored by USA player Maurice Edu off a free kick by Landon Donovan that would have given the USA a 3-2 lead with just about 4 minutes remaining.



The non-call, call, an assumed offsides penalty that Coulibaly did not verify by a named team or player, and was not explained to the USA team, launched a torrent of outrage that first appeared on Twitter and is now all over the web.

And the blog posts are blistering.

Koman compared to Jim Joyce 

Koman Coulibaly's call "makes it difficult to control one's rage" writes blogger Josh Dean in New York Magazine. Dean, comparing USA Soccer Coach Bob Bradley to the cartoon character Skeletor, blogs, Coulibaly flat out stole the game. His instincts were terrible for the entire 90 minutes, but his decision to disallow the U.S. team's third goal — an easy tap-in by Edu off a beautiful free kick from Donovan — was one of the worst calls I've ever seen in a game."

Will Brinson, writing for AOL's Fanhouse Blog, offers a complete understatement: "Koman Coulibaly quickly had his Wikipedia page defaced following the US v. Slovenia 2-2 draw. Right now, he's not a very popular man in America."

Danny Lopez at the Houston Press Blogs, calls Koman Coulibaly "the Jim Joyce of Soccer", which means, if that comparison is taken to its logical end, we should expect Koman Coulibaly to apologize for the call come Saturday in America.

Jim Joyce is the MLB umpire who took away Detroit Tigers Armando Galarraga's perfect game, then apologized for it a day later.

One can only hope.