I will go one further, the free kick would have gone to the defender for wrapping his arm round the defender....over to you Tommo!!!!
Someone's been on the Madleys wiki page Cant/wont post it as there is a naughty word in it and I can't edit it....
I didn't see the game today but just think it's reassuring that he played well today as he's going to be a vital player for us this year.
Just got back from the game. Infuriating. Gutting. Massively frustrating. However, bad refereeing decisions happen, that's football. We had one go massively against us today. But next game we might get go our way. My biggest irate is that, yet again, we have gone through a whole summer without signing a top goalscorer. No way in top level football should Long have been walking off the pitch without at least one goal, given the chances which fell his way. You cannot miss those chances and expect to succeed as a team. I love Long, love him. But today summed up his career, showing why there is a limit to his abilities. He is not someone who will bang the goals in. Forget the awful decision in the 94th minute, the game would have already been over if we'd had someone to finish. (And even after falling behind, there was still time for another chance to fall Long's way) PS. Did Puel spend the first half with his back to the game? We played very well, and for the most part it did look like we were back playing 4-2-3-1 (or 4-3-3, given Davis was often sucked deep) - fair play Mr P. So why revert back to the diamond at HT, with Long coming on to play LM and Tadic the focal point through the middle? I'd love to know if it was Puel who realised the error of his change, and re-changed it after about an hour, or if the likes of Long and Tadic took matters into their own hands.
I reckon it was the players first half as well. Davis saw we had a huge gap in the middle so drifted in and back.
The main problem isn't the penalty itself because you can argue both ways on that (it wasn't a penalty.) The main problem is that Bobby Madley decided that stopping the game for a head injury wasn't mandatory when he is ref and allowed play to continue, the ball was cleared, Arsenal repositioned and then sent a long pass right into the box where Koscielny was still lying on the ground on the edge of the 6 yard box. So forgetting the fact that attackers and defenders would have to be watching where they stand, he was also just in front of our keeper in an offside position and he could have been laid there with a serious injury while Bobby Madley decided he wanted to play on. Referees have been told they MUST stop the game immediately for a head injury, not that they "should." They do not have the discretion to continue especially when the player is left prone in the area that he was.
I really want to hear from ref's after the game to explain these situations, that would make it far easier to accept!
You also saw Fraser desperately trying to point this out as Koscielny was lying there prior to the "penalty".
I'm really curious about this, as well. We generally start each half playing pretty rigidly in the diamond, but it frequently morphs into something rather different. Seems to work better when it does, too, though sometimes with a bit of confusion (I'm wondering whether Jay might have been pulled off because he was remaining up top quite a bit in the first half, rather than moving wide and deep out of possession, because his frequent proximity to Tadic suggested that it wasn't a tactical innovation). Regarding Long, he's the sort of striker who scores on a high volume of attempts...but when going well, he generates a high volume. Problem is that we simply aren't getting too many at the moment; missing 2 of 2 decent-to-good chances looks far worse than scoring 1 of 5. I'd still play him, however, because he's the only striker really getting into positions from which any chances are derived.
