actually, Italy is the most penalized team only because of the Balkan refs mafia
and I'm sure it will get worse and worse unless someone less compromised than the current managers would eventually take over as the leader of the FINA technical commission and send some refs where they deserve to go (home, to be polite)...
"regular" 20 secs exclusion don't count that much to say someone is playing dirty or not, it's just the style of defense (if you play press zone all the time and have to cope with centers of the opposing teams that are twice yours in size, it's obvious that you get a lot of exclusions against you)...
I only agree that experienced players like Renzuto (but also younger players -in terms of international games played- like Bruni) shouldn't get involved in stupid reaction fouls that lead to brutality exclusion and consequential disqualification for the following matches...
but they didn't start anything, they were just stupid to get caught reacting to other players' dirty plays...
however, what Butnikovic did yesterday (and just the fact that he was designated to ref that match, after the prologue he had against us in the prep tournament in Cagliari a couple of weeks ago) is just sh*t, pure sh*t...
even forgetting for a while that he acted like an idiot for the whole game (and against the game of waterpolo, not against a team in particular), the fact that he decided the final outcome of the match with 1 single wrong (but wrong isn't enough, I'm sure he was totally in bad faith) call, it's unacceptable under any circumstance and from any point of view...
he shouldn't be an international ref anymore meanwhile I'm pretty sure he will officiate again, maybe even the bronze medal match tomorrow with Italy in the pool...
p.s. the Croatian coach was interviewed by the Italian TV just at the end of the match and when he was asked to say something about the decisive action, he felt so ashamed that he started saying that from his side he couldn't see anything at that distance therefore he couldn't have any opinion until he watched the action on TV...and this says a lot, I guess...