As I said at the time, Jose got his "diving in and nearly giving away a penalty" trick out the way early today
Can't get MOTD at the moment, but remember Fonte lunging in but from my angle it looked like he block tackled the ball away from Boyd. It was a close call, but think it would have been a soft one
Are you sure? I am sure the direction the ball took was from Fontes contact on it. (removes rose tinted glasses and going for another look).
Looked like a pen, but can quite understand why it wasn't given from where the ref was standing. Had a clear view, but it looked like Fonte got the ball from there.
So you're saying that Vic being 1 yellow away from a 2 game ban had nothing to do with him being on the bench? Okay then.
I agree with Tintin....every game is worth 3 points. You can try to be clever, then lose the easier game. It's not as if there is another cut off point coming up. I think Koeman thought that Burnley would be defensive and he wanted to increase the chance of scoring in the first half, then could bring Big Vic on to defend later in the game. His introduction was speeded up because we lost Forster and had a goal to defend.
I think many on this forum have got the Shearer disease 'There was contact. It's a penalty'. There was definitely contact. Fonte stepped on at least 1/16th of an inch of Boyd's boot, however does that constitute a foul? Boyd was far too ready to leap into the air as someone alluded to earlier and there is no way that the contact made would result in his heels hitting his arse 2 foot above the ground let alone hindered him in anyway. Saying that I have seen them all given because of the 'Shearer disease'.
I thought Jose got a bit of the ball, but a lot of Boyd's foot. Penalty for me too. But as Fran says, hey ho..!
That's a good point you make. Wasn't aware that it was called Shearer disease, but I kind of like the term.
It was a lot like the non-call on Ivanovic last week to me. The contact was enough to hinder Boyd's ability to play the ball (had he tried), and so Fonte gained a big advantage as he was otherwise beat badly. So technically, it's a foul. And it's in the penalty area, which means it is a penalty kick. But as it was not what I consider a dangerous tackle, nor was it a professional foul or a clear goal scoring opportunity a penalty kick (plus red card) would have been extremely harsh. The fair thing to me would have been a direct free kick outside the box. But when you think about all the similar situations (Liverpool, Chelsea, Burnley and more) that Fonte has found himself in, I think we are very fortunate not to have given up a penalty yet this season.