Not sure the best thread for this (not allowed on the Mouser watch I seem to remember) but here goes. Interesting to hear the match commander of Hillsborough admitting that it was his fault that the tunnel was open and the pens filled up, thus crushing the spectators. True as far as it goes and I hope some kind of closure for the bereaved. However, not one report I've heard has made reference to the cages around the pitch that the over-zealous authorities put up, which is probably worth mentioning for people who perhaps do not remember that sad time for football. Surely if the cages were not there, then even if there had been a terrible policing mistake then the crowd could have spilled onto the pitch. I've always thought the cages were some kind of "revenge" against hooligans, but how much is revenge worth if nearly 100 people die? Say all you like about pitch invasions, and they are again in the news, but people don't tend to be killed as a result. Basically I'm saying that whilst the police were culpable for the mistakes of Hillsborough and the police and others should certainly be investigated for the subsequent cover up, surely the original policy for caging the crowd should also be mentioned.
There's lots of blame to go around, in my opinion. The authorities had fair warning for problems at that ground, yet they persisted with it. Our lot nearly ended up on the receiving end of a similar tragedy in 1981, but for a couple of slices of luck. The same **** happened for several years after that and nobody bloody did anything. The whole thing was a disgrace that was built up to for over a decade.
The most important factor that is constantly overlooked is the fact that Hillsborough did not have a valid safety certificate for a whole decade. How is it that nobody has ever thought of bringing The FA and the Football League to account for allowing matches to take place at a ground that should not have hosted a match for ten whole years as it had not passed a safety inspection? After all, Spurs fans were damn close to suffering a similar tragedy in the exact same part of the ground during a 1981 FA Cup semi against Wolves, and yet neither The FA nor the Football League bothered to step in.
It's a classic case of the law of unintended consequences, or another proof that what you don't know can hurt you. People who (I will guess) not only knew nothing useful about the intersection of crowds and their accommodation in facilities saw one problem, pitch invasions, and came up with what seemed to them a perfectly sensible solution. There were experts who should have been consulted, but people who are not interested in knowledge often enough never even realize that expertise in a field is possible. The parallel I can think of is with W's wars, when no one in the United States who mattered seemed aware that there are things called strategy and military history, and that not knowing either or both is a recipe for getting sucked into losing wars by your enemies. "I'm mad now" seemed like an obvious and commonsensical reason for war, just as cages seemed an obvious and commensensical solution to pitch invasions.
What a sickener for Millwall. 2-0 up with five minutes to go and they draw 2-2. They really needed that, too.
What a game at Twickenham! England beat France 55-35, but lose the title by 6 points. Fair play to the French, they came to make a game of it, and what a game it was.
I think that most goalkeepers would've put this away, let alone outfield players: I wonder if his manager's wife would've buried it?
It's a little known fact (allegedly) that before he came to England, he was hypnotised and made to believe that he was a centre half in the mould of Martin Keown. That was great defensive header.
Add the pile of ref controversies this weekend to the vast catalogue of errors so far. I think it is fair to say that it is impossible to keep track on how this has affected the league table. However I think it is indisputable that decisions have made a huge impact and the bollox about things "evening out over the season" is total crap. So in a business worth billions, the final placement is as much decided by subjective decisions made without support in the heat of the moment (second). This cannot continue, and the authorities are letting the sport down (and especially the fans) by neglecting their responsibilities in this. I do start to wonder why I bother if the final table is almost as much down to the whims of the officials (and in many matches more important) - which as we all know tend to favour certain teams - as the interaction between the teams.
I couldn’t agree more. I was amusing myself by trying to guesstimate how many points have been awarded based on bad decisions: Arsenal: 15 + (another handball ignored last week against Hull) Liverpool 10 to 15 the Mancs 5 to 10 Chelsea: 0 to 5 Spurs 0 to -5 I haven’t watched Southampton enough to get a good idea, but think they may be in the 0 to 5 range. The way bad calls turned around Arsenal and Pool’s seasons this year was particularly outrageous. There were 3-4 weeks they both got wins gifted to them when continued bad form would have put them out of the running for fourth. Chelsea was getting the rub of the green till Mourinho tried to up the ante. That backfired.
The media coverage of incidents is quite all over the place, too. Our penalty on the weekend was controversial at best and never a penalty at worst, with no explanations as to why. Arsenal's handball was dismissed though, despite the defender clearly moving his hand to the ball. Some of the pundits are unbelievably poor or biased.
So the BBC are looking for somebody tall and opinionated who is happy to leave Richard Hammond on top of a mountain for several days. I've already sent in my CV.
What on earth is Martin Atkinson doing refereeing at International level ? The man is hopeless at PL level, so whoever gave him the Scotland v Ireland game, needs shooting.
