I was impressed with Adebayor and his attitude too our fans when they played us pre season, - he applauded the Ponty end when he went off and took the game in good spirit. Yesterday it seemed that he went to celebrate a goal after having received a large amount of stick from the home fans.</p> My point is, and we see it at Oakwell too, that a previous player gets no end of stick, abuse, disgusting foul chants aimed at them then the 'fans' find it acceptable to dish it out. As soon as anything is given back in the way of a celebration then they are being incited to riot! As someone mentioned on here the faces of some people shouting the abuse show what amounts to hatred and disgust. An old saying that I like is "If you can't take it then don't dish it out!" Why is it that it is seen as acceptable to dole out abuse but we are mortally offended when some is given back?</p> I appreciate that some of it goes over the top (I still despise Stoke City for their goading of us a couple of seasons ago) but some of the people in the crowd would get arrested if they performed the way they did out on the street. I don't hold any water with those that say they are professional footballers and shouldn't react - the games not like that! Time for people to take some responsibility for their own actions.</p>
I found myself whinging on about the Stoke incident last night to a bunch of Aussies watching the Stoke Chelsea match. Maybe I should let it go! I did laugh when Chelsea scored the last minute winner. But it highlights the problem with players responding to chants and calls from the crowd. We are told retrospectively that a section of our crowd, possibly in the West Stand, were making racist remarks to Fuller. The next minute several of the Stoke players are goading our fans, despite the vast majority being innocent. Lawrence was having a go pretty much directed my way after scoring. I'm not really used to that. And that is the problem. You cannot react to a crowd just because individuals have acted out of line. It's the actions of an imbecile. Edit: The goal scored by Lawrence wasn't from a penalty was it. He was put through and scored from close range.
The stoke incident a couple of years ago When one of their players made death threats (through gestures) to barnsley fans once again showed the FA to be a bunch of idiots. The player in question was given a warning by south yorkshire police after the match because of the incident and yet the FA refused to punish him
