He is great to watch when he plays well and could teach Lennon about the need to shoot more often but equally he could learn from Lennon and stop diving. Thought it was embarrassing against Real Madrid, thought it was embarrassing against Liverpool and todays was beyond embarrassing. If he ain't careful he'll get a reputation akin to that of Suarez and that'll only end up costing us as a team when ref's don't give us penalties or free kicks in good positions because he has a reputation and they give the defenders the benefit of the doubt by assuming he's dived again. I know he gets kicked stupid at times and has 2 serious injuries in the past but there is no need to dive.
RCL have to agree it does get embarrassing, but Suarez does it because he has been doing it for years. Bale probably does it because he's probably anticipating a kicking- when it doesn't come he looks like a twat.
He did dive today that was clear, however I have always hated the fact that in English football people seem to applaud sliding tackles and heavy challenges. Bale has been injured several times by awful challenges so I don't blame him for making sure his legs aren't planted on the ground for someone to break and to anticipate a foul coming to try to avoid injury.
Whilst it is difficult to defend what, after all, is cheating, King does have a point. Bale has been afforded very little protection from the Charlie Adams of the game. if officials had done their job properly, maybe he wouldn't feel the need to protect himself, or redress the balance by doing this.
Bale has had some nasty knocks in the past but there's no excuse for him to be falling over thin air. If he's worried that there may be a collision with the opposition player, then he should merely jump out the way/ pull out of the 50-50 ball. Going down like he did yesterday not only embarrasses himself but it embarrasses the club too in my opinion. Such an amazing player yet this isn't the first time he's done this, really needs to cut it out. Last thing I want is for him to get a similar reputation to Suarez - who I absolutely despise. Like RCL said, take a leaf out of Lennon's book. He's the smallest player on the pitch and I reckon it's fair to say arguably the weakest and yet he doesn't deliberately drop to the floor if he thinks a tackle maybe a bit rough. Would also like to congratulate Lennon on his goal yesterday, he's had a really good start to the season in my opinion and the goal capped off a fine week for him what his recall to the England squad.
There is a huge difference between doing anything ( including diving ) to avoid getting 'taken out' and trying to win a penalty ( a la Suarez / Ashley Young ) Before people start to criticise Bale for making sure he leaves the field of play with the same number of legs with which he entered it, perhaps they need to ask themselves - " what would I do - stand there and get my legs broken or 'move' out of the way by any means possible ?"
He didn't move out the way though did he... He dived and swung his left leg inwards to make it look like he'd been tripped, admittedly he didn't make a claim for a foul, probably because he knew how stupid it looked. Moving out the way would have been either side stepping Guzan (at speed it may have been hard granted) or jumping over Guzan's swinging leg when he hit the ball.
Don't see the point of this, I think its better to not draw attention to it, yes its bad, but Young and Welbeck have had equally high profile bad dives, and Suarez...well, is just Suarez. Don't like it at all, don't agree with it...never did it myself! , but its been in the game for decades, so every viewpoint around it has been discussed...for decades! Till the authorities come up with a 'blanket' rule for punishment using video evidence as proof, nothing will change.
I think you need to look at it again. Always Right is, ermm, right. [video=youtube;35XxKvylPY0]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QhX4X7oTx7M[/video] If you pause it on 5 seconds ish when he makes contact with the ball, he actually has both feet off the ground and what will become his standing leg is stretched out infront of him. There's no way he can jump in that position. As I said in another thread, if he is diving he's doing it without appealing and by tucking his leg away from the challenge instead of towards it which is different to everyother diver in the game. For me he's trying to protect himself and you can't convince me he wasn't unless Bale comes out and says he was trying to dive to get Guzan in trouble.
The more I see it the more it angers me. It's a dive. Simple as. I can't understand how you're trying to justify it. He chose to fall to the ground, if he's running at that speed worrying Guzan's going to clip him, he can more than easily jump over Guzan's potentially swinging leg or pull out completely. If this was Suarez or any other opposition player, we'd be ripping into him. Guzan wasn't running menacingly nor did he go diving in with two feet... It was a 50-50, Bale chose to take the cheating way out in my opinion. I can appreciate Bale's had some horrendous knocks in the past (mainly from that c*nt Adam) and therefore is cautious when going into situations like yesterday but it doesn't give him the right to fling himself to ground, it COULD have resulted in Guzan getting a booking had it been a different ref which would have been totally unjust. It was actually nice to see Guzan take a comical view of it, good sportsmanship too as most others would have ran to the ref bitching to get Bale booked.
Agreed. Let's not make excuses for him just because he's a Spurs player; it was a dive. Yes, he get's a rough time with challenges, but as somebody stated earlier - so does Lennon. No excuses for it, hopefully AVB will have a word with him about it, because it's not pleasant to see.
It's not until Bale gets the ball that Guzan feigns to trying to kick the ball/Bale. If someone came running up to you and pretended to kick you you'd flinch, wouldn't you? How's he supposed to jump out of the way when he's running full tilt? It's simple as for me too. There's more than enough in the clip to suggest Bale was trying to protect himself, arguing that he was diving or that if the ref got it wrong Bale wouldn't have corrected him is saying you can read Bale's mind and I'm pretty sure no one can do that. People are good at assuming the worst in other people though and for a Spurs fan going with the crowd on this one seems to me like you don't want to look biased.
I tend to agree with YV on this one. Just the fact that Bale didn't appeal, is a major part in this. if he had have done, we wouldn't be having this conversation as it would have been disgusting behaviour. for me, saying he's dived is as much of an argument as saying he's pulled out of the challenge due to the fear of getting hurt. there's nothing clearcut in that footage to say it's a definite dive, as there's too many other aspects tat suggest it might not be. - hence this discussion. Adding the fact that he hasn't appealed for it, it then doesn't make the incident anywhere near as bad as some are making out, IMO.
Bale is in good company, one of our idols and best players to grace the premier league, Jurgen Klinsmann, was widely considered to be the biggest diver the game had seen, granted he cleaned up his act when he came here, but I remember when we signed him, all the jokes/jibes about diving. Steven Gerrard, The liverpool captain and one of the most outspoken individuals on diving, has a video on youtube which clearly shows him diving and trying to win penalties. I'm sure we could go on and mention 100's of world class, talented players that dive, go down easy, or jump out the way of potential dangerous tackles, and no I don't agree with it, yet I don't believe Bale should be singled out, as every club has someone that goes down easy, for whatever reason. Take a look at Barca & Madrid, full of world class stars, do you think they stay on their feet, or do they do whatever it takes it win a foul or gain advantage? Yes its wrong and I hate seeing players dive, yet it is part of the game, especially with the most talented players, which makes it even more frustrating. Tony Pullis is right about the banning, after each week of games, the FA should appoint a panel to look at key incidents and if they find players go to ground, without any contact, then they should be handed a 3 match ban, and yes it will stop players diving.
Personally, I think they should pay more attention to the Adams' and Cattermoles' of the game. Plus any others who deliberately try to seriously injure a fellow professional. Yes, I agree that diving is wrong. But there are far worse things that need to be stamped out of the game first.
I wish that he'd stop, but I also wish that refs would stop ignoring blatant attempts to kick him out of the game, which we're seeing on an almost weekly basis now. About a minute after this dive, he went up to win a header and Lowton jumped up and kneed him in the small of his back. I wasn't surprised to him get nothing.
On the subject of diving, I'd have to suggest this as the worst so far this season: [video=youtube;R6T1uFc_0GQ]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R6T1uFc_0GQ[/video] He got a free-kick for that, too.
If someone came running up to me (in a football match obviously ) I wouldn't fake being hit and go to ground. I'd do my best to get out the way or try and clatter them first. Don't really understand the bit about being biased there though. Surely by NOT backing a Spurs player I'm being less bias? I try to look at things from a neutral perspective and to me it was a dive, if I were a Villa fan yesterday, I'd have joined them in the chants of "cheat, cheat cheat", Bale blatantly went to ground after no contact was made - that's a dive. As I've said before, Guzan wasn't even going in wrecklessly like a Cattermole/ Adam style challenge so it makes the dive look worse off too. Lets also not forget that this isn't the first time Bale has done simulation and in my opinion, this was probably the worst one he's committed. I can appreciate trying to move out the way, doing his best to halt his run or jumping over the possible challenge but he didn't, he went down making it look like he'd been clipped - which is wrong. I'll say it again, on another day, the ref may have booked Guzan for a challenge he never made which would have been completely unjust. I don't want our club/ players being branded cheats or divers, Bale certainly isn't helping the cause after his actions yesterday.
I was saying to me it seems that you don't want to be called biased(or "deluded" seeing as it's everyone's favourite word on this site) so aren't going against the general consensus and looking at it with "Bale's a diver" goggles. The rest of the post is old ground that we've both been over.
