I would never expect you to be impartial Marcus The pen in real time looks stone wall, but for me it was Altidore falling onto Azpilicueta. Altidore is responsible for where he puts his feet, nobody else. Either way, if I was a ref I'd have given it as well cos it looked nailed on in real time. For Larsson's there's no point discussing it with you, you are a Sunderland fan so you're not going to acknowledge the foul. It was an American football challenge mate, no intention of going for the ball, never looked at the ball and he rammed into Ramires' ribs whilst he was in mid-air. It was nothing like a shoulder barge. Either way, you don't care and I certainly don't care, all I was bothered about was that a ref has potentially taken the outcome of the league title into his own hands, if it was the other way round and his decision sealed your relegation fate he'd still be going unpunished. My point is that both managers should have complained about that ref, both had reasons to complain and the refs should have to be made accountable/stoned to death in public.
Not really anything about partiality. More to do with the massive grey area surrounding Larsson's challenge on Ramires - you see this happen at every corner and free kick swqung into the box. Defenders harrying, pushing and pulling other players - if you give one you have to give all of them. Just because it's one v one doesn't make it any more or less of a foul. Had it been John Terry everyone would've said "He's shown great strength to put the attacker off" - there would've been no mention of it being a penalty (mainly because no-one in the media cares about Sunderland) - and, as has been said, shoulder to shoulder contact is permitted - the only form of contact without playing the ball that is permitted - referee's (I'm level 1 trained although don't do it any more - kids footy) are told that when they are trained - I was told that on the level one course! Also - if you think Altidore's thinking is quick enough, in real time (less than 0.2 seconds), to know where to put his foot to be taken by Azpiliquetta, you truly haven't watched him play this season!! Oh and, by the way, there have been at least 4 blatant hand ball penalties not given to us (all of which would've meant more points for us) this season. In real time and in slow mo they were all penalties! Maybe this will even itself out over the course of the season . I don't even think the slow motion replay of our penalty could be given or not given - there is no way of knowing what caused Altidore to fall over - if it was Azpiliquetta then it's a penalty, if it was his own doing then it wasn't - still massively open to interpretation. There is no definitive "yes it is no it isn't" answer - Mike Dean said it was so I think it was.
Haha I envisaged something like that about Jozy Altidore as your reply! We'll agree to disagree on the Larsson/Ramires tackle. Ramires has been rightly punished for the later part, but unfortunately Dickhead Dean will not have to answer for his ineptitude.
Well yeah, that's a fair point. Bitter, sore-loser over here! Although Chelsea winning it wouldn't have been a basket of roses either.
My possible concern about this now would be if Chelsea lost against Liverpool would they try against Norwich and Cardiff? Obviously if Chelsea win title race still open and they would be playing for points. Lose means title gone and let's hurt Sunderland for what they did.
Spot on & I hope Chelsea get knock out of the champions league because if they get to the final then they will rest players for the Norwich & Cardiff games.
Chelski's second team is more than good enough for those two and players will be fighting for their place next season, so I'm really not worried about this. When Newcastle went down, we were playing Chelski at home in a game we were desperate to win and we still lost. Good job the mags and Hull were even worse than us that year.
