I won't say I've never been so disgusted by a group of officials in the PL before because I've gotten used to them being usually rubbish and often appalling.
I will say I can't remember seeing such a craven response to bullying as the officials in the Chelsea-Everton game made.
Mourinho walked out onto the field screaming about a correct call. The response, amazingly, was to do nothing to Mourinho and to call the next call incorrectly for Chelsea--and every call thereafter. Torres, who knows just how to chime in in the cheating and intimidation game (as opposed to the football game, where he's been useless for some time), then made an absolutely ludicrous comedy dive, both to get a free kick and to make it abundantly apparent to everyone on both teams that it would be 14 on 11 from then on. From there it was simply a matter of ratcheting up the pressure until someone, in this case Howard, broke.
On the other hand, while I didn't get a good look if there was simulation afterwards, I thought the foul for the free kick that led to the goal was correct--there was knee to knee contact. It wouldn't surprise me if Ramirez did dive afterwards, though, as he's got a long history of doing that.
Officials behaving like this makes a mockery of the idea of competition.
I'm feeling particularly incensed because I recently watched, for the first time in my life that I can remember, a team of officials get all three tricky big calls exactly right in Spurs loss in Dnipro. If you can get a competent crew in Dnipro, and you can't in London, something stinks to high heaven in the PL.
