They also thought on MOTD2 that the admirable behaviour of the Saints players prevented the second yellow by suggesting to the ref that the tackle wasn't that bad. I'm glad of that because I hate players trying to get another player sent off...because it suggests you don't think you can beat a team any other way.
He is pretty good at "buying" the foul though isn't he? Some ref's certainly see it that way and let it count against him. Yesterday I think his pace on the break terrified Cahill and Terry, and it was Mane and not the defenders who kept getting the benefit of the doubt. Not every ref gives him that and you can sort of see why.
I see on MOTD2 that Mane was caught in his delicate little place...perhaps he and Elia can compare wounds. <---- laugh as only a woman can laugh.
What? He was 25 yards out! And there are covering defenders. To suggest there could be a straight red is ludicrous.
You pair of num-nuts. You're arguing about different things. Tom you are talking about the incident in the second half, Tintin is talking about the penalty.
Matic should've been sent off, as that tackle was probably the most standard yellow card challenge you'll see: Mane breaking away, and cynically hacked down - no attempt to play the ball. Not surprised that Tom disagrees, but he is slightly biased. I, like Fran, also saw a little bit of MOTD 2, when they praised our players' behaviour about not surrounding the referee. That is good to see, and is what we should see. That being said, no excuses for Mike Dean not to show a second yellow. Still, delighted with a point, which we thoroughly deserved.
I didn't say the penalty incident was a nailed on red Einstein. I said it could have been a red with a strict ref, as one poster was claiming it wasn't even a yellow card offence. I was just making it extra clear that he deserved two yellows. You need to man up and accept Dean bottled it. He should have sent Matic off yesterday. Mourinho was desperate to get Matic off the field as soon as he could. He knows Matic got very very lucky. This is getting boring now, so let's leave it at that.
Dean also let Schneiderlin get away with a certain yellow on Fab later on. But I was under the impression stopping a breakaway cynically was an auto yellow, so I was surprised Matic wasn't off, you can't have a warning for ending a counter attack can you? If he wasn't already on a yellow he would have definitely got one for it.
If you commit a foul solely for the purposes of disrupting play, then that is unsporting and a yellow. The non-called, second yellow falls into that category. But for the first yellow, it's not clear to me that Matic's foul was "professional," as opposed to simply a mistimed, possibly-a-little-desperate challenge. He does get the ball. Which I realize does not negate the foul, but it does call into question whether he was cynically just playing the man. So if you view the first yellow as possibly being a little harsh, then I can see why you might cut the player a bit of a break on the second yellow. Saints had the advantage, but it certainly wasn't anywhere close to DOGSO. But this is why DOGSO is such a stupid rule. If Matic makes that same tackle 20 yards up the pitch not on a breakaway, it's not a yellow card. But because it happened in the penalty area, it could be a red card, 2 game suspension, and a penalty. And because of that, everyone expects at least some kind of card for any foul in the area and people view the yellow on Matic as lenient because he could have seen red. And then they wonder why players dive. That play was very similar to the Fonte play against Liverpool. Fonte also got the ball, but once he launched into that tackle there was no way he wasn't also going to take out the player in an unsafe manner. But Fonte got nothing. In part, I think because it wasn't that great of a goal scoring situation. It probably would have resulted just a cross. And a penalty kick would have been rather harsh for a mistake foul. And yet if that play takes place 20 yards up the pitch no one would have had a problem with a foul being called-- not a yellow, but just a foul.
