Fixed

I'm sorry, but the only way you can come to this conclusion is if you've never played football.

There's a ball there to be won, and the player makes a move to win the ball. He's late and doesn't make contact, so it's reasonable that the ref might book him for the challenge. If he does, the player will likely hold his hands up and say "aye alright ref, I tried but it was a bit late."

If I'm his manager, I'd be more angry if he doesn't go for that ball than if he gets booked mistiming the challenge.

This is the problem with the modern game, there's constant hyperbole about mundane ****. No wonder the refs are under so much pressure.

And I don't even have any idea what happened after and whether that warranted another yellow.... will see when MOTD2 comes on!

 

TBF having seen it now, the second challenge also warrants a yellow

 

I think the first one is a red, but can understand why it was only given as a yellow. It's not clear cut, those kind of challenges get both reds and yellows. For me... it made me wince. I felt it just watching it. I remember being tackled like that and it's not fun. I've also been on the receiving end of tackles where the player has been sent off but shouldn't have been. They tend to be more spectacular than that, you're running at pace and go flying but the guy tackling you was genuinely going for the ball, mistimed it and simply tripped you. You go spinning up in the air, but there's no studs into your leg. That one by Kovacic I think is nasty, but 'Makes Jay wince' isn't part of the laws of the game. This type of tackle will always be open to interpretation as to whether it's red or yellow.

The second is a yellow card. It just is, under any interpretation of the rules and as such Kovacic should have walked. And surely, even if you think the first is only a yellow, you'd still be thinking, "That really could have been a red, I don't want to send anyone off, but that was on the very severe side of yellow." So, if the same player then commits a similar, albeit a little less dangerous, foul, you'd just send the bugger off. I get why refs can be reluctant to send someone off after one challenge, but what type of ref wants anyone in the game who is repeatedly putting other players at risk of injury? Get them out of there.

 

Yes definitely. But as you say the rhetoric going around Twitter is so annoying. No refs are fixing anything. Man City got screwed from the referee last week too. Obviously Liverpool did as well. The referee could quite easily have pulled up loads of fouls what he didn't give in favour of City if something was amiss. Truth is, they're just incompetent - as we've experienced ourselves at this level.

 

Simple question. Did the tackle from behind with studs showing that contacted the players leg endanger the safety of the opposition? Personally I think it's impossible to argue that it didn't.

 

Was Phillips' challenge at Wembley really any worse..?

 

No because it was his trailing foot which caught the player.

 

Of course not. A £6million pound game (notwithstanding the millions also wagered on it) referee'd by a bloke making £10k a year as an official, yet apparently the thought that it was fixed is far fetched

 

Just watched MOTD2 and Bruno G for Newcastle some how avoided being sent off too. Not to mention West ham player got booked for waving imaginary flag when fouled, yet almiron did the same for Newcastle, but no booking. Fixed?

 

I seem to see a lot of these "different match - same incidents" happen lately. 75% of the time they get a completely different decision. No consistency whatsoever. I'm going to start recording them

 

I think there's a real problem with officiating where refs seem to be reticent in punishing the "big clubs" but show no hesitation when it's a "little club". Always been like that and I can't see it changing any time soon.

You can trace it back down the years to 1921 when the EFL voted Arsenal into division 1 instead of Barnsley.

 

Well I never

 

What conflict of interests? Nothing to see here.

 

That was a straight up case of bribery though. The Arsenal Chairman admitted this later.

 

PLUS ÇA CHANGE, PLUS C'EST LA MÊME CHOSE....

 

I've always said that the likelihood that there are is at least one official in the premier League or football league that has taken a bribe on at least one occasion is far higher than the likelihood that it never happens considering their relatively low wage, the obscene amount of money in football and the willingness of a large number of owners to break financial rules.