I don't understand this need from people for the FA to be consistent on comparable events years ago. 50 odd years ago we still had capital punishment. Should we still be sentencing people to death in the name of consistency? Attitudes of individuals and societies change over time whether for better or worse. I'm sure Paul Davies would be given a life time ban in today's football for breaking a fellow players jaw and endangering his life. It's been mentioned by a few on this thread but the FA must produce clear and comprehensive guidelines on how punishments are distributed and these should be reviewed and published every year. They have bought out a structure on how to deal with racism and this needs to be extended.
I would say it's about the same, there is a difference between trying to hurt someone and trying to injure someone. I major annoying difference is the amount of simulation in football, that is one thing that I'm glad to say is very rare in rugby.
Since rugby is a contact sport there is rarely an advantage in exaggerating contact. If people are fouled though, tripped or tackled off the ball for example, they tend to dive just as theatrically as footballers in an attempt to get the officials' attention.
Very cogently put. Perhaps you'd like to defend this? http://www.guardian.co.uk/sport/2009/jul/20/harlequins-fined-heineken-cup If that can't be called simulation I don't know what can. Rugby players cheat all the time, it's part of the game. If they could get an advantage by behaving like footballers, they would do it.
The key here is the premeditated nature of it. Or at least compared to a mistimed tackle. But still, some nasty, purposeful elbows-to-face don't get punished in this way, and in my view are way worse! I think most of the fine should be for his atrocious acting afterwards, when he started limping around. I agree with Carragher that the FA should help Suarez - and pay for him to have acting lessons. RADA or similar.
Of what? Rugby players cheating? Watch any game of rugby and you'll see ten examples of that in the first ten minutes. 'Simulation' itself is hardly unique to football. Take a look at this from basketball: [video=youtube;e4pjJHiqCFE]http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=e4pjJHiqCFE#![/video]
I've not seen that at all, every time I've seen someone over exaggerate a fall (never seen anyone fall when not tripped), which i think was a grand total of about 3 times in hundreds of internationals, they have been ridiculed by the fans of both teams and commentators. There was an article on the last one i saw which condemned it and said steps should be taken to make sure that type of thing doesn't creep into rugby. Maybe you've seen it at a lower level (rather than international), I don't watch club rugby much, or rugby league.
No I've seen it in internationals, usually when someone chases their own high kick they will end up on the floor. I'll accept that sometimes they're looking at the ball and run into someone accidentally, but they're often simply looking for a penalty. Similarly, on the rare occasion someone gets deliberately tripped (with a foot), I've seen players make a hell of a meal out of it.
The only time i've seen it was when they are tripped off the ball, and that is very rare. On the high balls I would tend to give them the benefit of the doubt, when all that weight it moving in one direction at speed and someone is in the way, often running into the player and falling over is the safest option rather than risking getting injured by twisting something. Never seen em rolling over 10 times, waving their arms in the air and arguing there case with the ref for 10 mins, for one the ref would soon tell em where to go, probably the sin bin.
Well I'm not going to spend time looking for specific examples, it's so commonplace that specific examples are rarely highlighted. You might find these interesting reading though (from the first page of a google search for 'cheating in rugby'), where some specific examples are mentioned: http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/johnbeattie/2010/04/cheating_has_crept_into_rugby.html http://www.theroar.com.au/2011/09/30/england-admit-to-cheating-at-rugby-world-cup/ http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/ru...enwood-Time-to-examine-cheating-in-rugby.html In the last one Will Greenwood opens an article with the line "There is a long tradition of cheating in rugby" I don't think it's really arguable that rugby players are always probing the limit of what they can get away with.
Pochettino on Suarez's ban: âFor me the ban is not the most worrying thing, the most worrying thing is to know and understand what motivated Suarez's behaviour." "I think there needs to be some kind of punishment but at the same time you have players who go in hard on tackles and they got only maybe two games or three games."
The saddest comment is that from LFC, a club that seems to have the moral compass of an amoeba. OK keep the guy, but don't whinge. Particularly sad is that it was a day when Scousers were meant to be remembering a brave woman who had been so instrumental in helping to bring a sense of justice to the whole Hillsborough story.
If he's able to reform his character, sure, he's a phenomenal player. It's not something we realistically have to worry about though.
No, absolutely not, but it's interesting to see just how much being a great footballer might allow us to forgive.
