Doesn't 'border' at all. The likes of the Mail and Mirror invade the land of Racism, occupy the capital city, rape all the women and sell the population into slavery.
If the target of hate was a Fergie, Mourhino or Wenger player those managers would be more in the hacks faces in a far nastier way than Brendan, can't remember another overseas player hounded like Suarez.
Suarez's pen was a dive...but in mitigation quite a few fouls on him were not given, I guess cos' of his reputation for diving. This latest penalty incident will not help him in the future to get decisions. THB if he keeps banging goals in like he is, he should just forget the Tom Daley impersonations he does not need to do it. Lots of players dive, some do it more often than others, two Manure players spring to mind, the new young lad Januzaj and Young, both serial offenders who will find it gets harder to win decisions. We have had a couple of pens lately Altidore was tackled in the midriff by a Fulham defender, it was a foul/pen but he exaggerated his dive to ensure he got his pen, Johnston sped into the box and was clipped and fell down, I am less sure of that one. My solution is to have video refs, they do in Cricket, Rugby Tennis etc and if somebody has deliberately dived it is a sending off and 3 match ban
So if Altidore makes the most of the contact it's 'exaggeration', but when Suarez does it's a dive? You're not seriously contending that there was no contact yesterday are you?
If a "video ref" had saw the incident and decided there was contact but that the player went over easy he'd still have to give it based on the contact made but TV pictures aren't always conclusive because of the camera angles.
I am not saying that video replay's are 100% accurate all of the time, but they do improve the chances of getting a right decision, if the angles not right and what sort of contact is made is uncertain, there is a margin of doubt, give the benefit of the doubt to the defensive team, thats what lots of refs do anyway as it avoids the big decision being seen as very wrong and costing them their next game. For instance I mentioned Johnson's penalty, he was speeding into the box, it does not need a significant amount of contact, rather just a clip and a fast runner will go to ground. However if you are almost static in the box a little bit on contact does not mean you should throw yourself to the ground.
Why should a dive be a red card and a 3 match ban? Are we going to start red carding people for claiming throw ins and corners that aren't theirs? After all, they are also trying to deceive the referee to gain an advantage. Red carding people for diving is the worst idea I've ever heard. Firstly because as you've said yourself its a really hard to tell if someone dived even with video evidence and secondly its obvious that certain people e.g. Suarez, Januzaj, Young etc would be discriminated against because of their reputation (deserved or not).
Do they rescind these cards when the foul is later proven? I ask because when we played Sunderland (ironically) last season Suarez was booked for a 'dive' against O'****e that was clearly seen to be a penalty on later tv replays.
I don't see why we all assume that fast players will go down under minimal contact simply because they're running fast. Lets say you're in the park running, or even walking, and someone knocks into you. A human's first instinct is to step in the direction they've been knocked with hands out, attempting to regain balance. That's instinctive. If their leg buckles and they head to ground, the hands stretch forward to break the fall and cushion it. That's natural and it looks awkward as f**k. Look at people trip up on steps or a curb, it's hilarious because of the stumble, the step and the awkward re-balancing. In football, their basic instinct is to let the legs do absolutely nothing and have arms thrown up in the air. Result? A beautiful swan dive with limp legs as they collapse on the floor with a roll. I'm fed up of this, 'there's contact which brought him down because he was moving fast' because frankly, that's bull****. I'm also fed up of the whole, 'if there's contact, he's entitled to go down'. The players (in general)make no effort to even try to stay up, that much is obvious. It's unnatural, and it's coached or drilled into them by the clubs and probably because they get nothing from refs for blatant fouls. Look at Sterling last week. Yeah he was going fast and cutting across the defender and yes, there was contact, but his legs just went limp and he dropped. No effort to try stay up. Suarez today, contact and dropped. He could have kept going but, obviously, the ball was running out so pointless to continue. That's just two games for two of our players. Personally, I wouldn't have given either of them a penalty, told the players to grow up, man up (sorry, can't say that anymore) and get up. Diving is unnatural and goes against basic human instinct. It exists in the game because of a few reasons; refs are inept at calling real fouls so players have to exaggerate their contact instead, managers are more in the mindset of 'win at any cost' and do little to condemn players who do dive because they get something out of it - perhaps even encouraging it - through freekicks, penalties and bookings for opposition, fans are too eager to defend their own players with pathetic excuses of 'contact was made' or 'he was running fast' which don't actually explain the going to ground anyway and pundits/media are biased in their reporting or too afraid to make a mockery of players who do dive because it isn't good practice for them be out of favour. Apparently, top level football is the only form of football where diving is so common place. Every other level just sees the would-be diver laughed at and embarrassed for being a weak player who needs to become stronger on the ball. Why? We do we accept such pathetic people?
Suarez IMHO was barely touched and he used the 'touch' to dive. Johnston's penalty is close to this as he had only a slight touch, he however was moving at pace at the time. If you have seen Altidore's penalty it was one one the easiest decisions a ref has had to make. The Fulham player was no where near the ball and made what must be one the most clumsiest tackles ever putting the whole of his leg into Jozy's midriff, the ref was blowing before the defenders leg was back on the ground...Altidore once again IMHO made sure the ref knew what had happened, in no way do I condone this..the pen could have been reversed for stupid behaviour.
I think the idea is that it wouldn't be given in the first place and we'd get a penalty in the first place. The problem with that is you'd have to stop the game every time a player appeals against the referee's decision which would just make the game last long. The only I think that might be able to work is an appeal system like cricket/tennis where the captain has 1 or 2 appeals available to him each game. Again there's loads of problems with that in the sense that penalties/handballs/dives aren't clear cut and slow motion can make things look worse than they actually are.
I hate cheats and diving and anything that can help eradicate it I would welcome. Missing games for cheating seems to me a step in the right direction. If Suarez was not one of many serial divers he would get more decisions when he is fouled (which is often cos' he is a good player). You will be blaming Sunderland for the beach ball incident next.
In your world does stealing yards at throw-ins and free kicks, pulling opponents shirts/shorts, taking longer than needed to leave the pitch when subbed, claiming throw-ins etc count as cheating?
There are degrees of cheating, diving for a penalty and pretending you are hurt to get a fellow pro booked/sent off are high up there, I believe some of the things you mention could be given a yellow by the ref if they so chose. I used to play abit of Rugby and if you back-chatted a ref he move the kick 10 yards up the pitch, perhaps that could be used in football for a range of minor offences? We all want to tell our kids that cheats do not prosper..except of course if you play professional football?
In respect of the Suarez penalty yesterday, it was a penalty for 2 reasons: Firstly the Ref said it was. Secondly Suarez ensured that it was a penalty. As soon as Suarez got a toe on the ball and the goalie had dived at his feet and didn't touch the ball then Suarez only needed to continue in a straight line for contact to be made (the straight line is important as Suarez is not required by the laws of the game to take evasive action). As for cheating in general then we have to accept that it has always been part of the game at all levels. Every time you commit a deliberate foul then you are seeking to gain an advantage of some type by cheating
Why not throw a deliberate elbow in there too? (pun intended) Call recall who it was on Suarez but he could have seen red for that.
Fully agree with this^ The way players fall is not "natural" at all, regardless of whether they are running fast or not, and is designed purely to get the decision. It's all been said, but I'm late to this party, so, in my opinion; our penalty, for the second week running, was a soft one. Suarez, for the umpteenth week running, has been kicked, elbowed and generally knocked about from arsehole to breakfast-time without the protection of the officials. If this is supposedly justified by his reputation, then that is blatantly unprofessional of the ref, but it is also wrong. For every decision he does get, there are half a dozen he should have been given but have been ignored, so before people bang on about it being "justice" of some sort, they should take that into account.
All you have to do is listen to the players and ex-player pundits as they all commonly use the term "he felt a touch". Well I have never known a touch to be able to knock me over let alone destabilise me.
