In recent weeks we’ve seen many players go down in the search of penalties, free-kicks and to get the opposition sent off but should we be so critical of the modern day footballer.
I’m uncertain as to how long ago it was when the F.A. decided that a referee can book a player for a deliberate dive but for many years now it is rare for a footballer to get booked for a dive.
Andy Carroll skipped round Tim Krul this weekend and deliberately tried to fool the referee into awarding a penalty but was pulled up and given a card for his actions. This was a brilliant piece of refereeing as the men in black these days are so reluctant to book divers.
I recall the Wolves Wigan game a few months ago where Stephen Hunt went round Ali Al-Habsi who clipped the Irishman who decided to stay on his feet and resulted in Wigan getting the ball clear.
A month later Wolves played Sunderland where Sebastian Larsson flung himself into the air with one of the worst dives I have ever seen.
He gained the penalty but justice was done as he missed the spot kick. Wolves again were robbed by another spot kick which potentially may have cost them a place in the Premier League as an ex-player dived at the weekend to gain a spot kick for Bolton which enabled them to draw level.
James Perch was barely touched by Pepe Reina but went down theatrically resulting in getting the Liverpool keeper sent off and securing the win for his side with ten minutes to go.
I’m totally against diving but as referees hardly punish a dive you have to ask yourself why wouldn’t a player dive? Judging by the actions from this season it seems the teams that contain theatrical players seem to get more from the referees so as they continue to let players get away with it diving it will continue to get worse and worse.
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The problem with punishing James Perch, is that it results in no punishment for Reina potentially. I found it amusing the Danny Murphy critised Perch, earlier in the season when we played Fulham, Murphy did something similar to Tiote who didn’t react and Murphy got away with it. If the FA were better at punishing these things retrospectively then maybe players wouldn’t feel the need to overact to highlight the offence to the ref.
Odd how Suarez did a few dives, waved imaginary cards in that game, and not a word said, eh ?
TBF this report is the fairest Ive seen from national media.
We Newcastle fans are just waiting for the FA to try to “punish” Perch.
But if they do, they’ll have a court case. The pictorial evidence back up Perch. Doesn’t matter he over-reacted. They would have to “do” Carroll then, and the National media wouldn’t like that.
Perch did not “get” Reina sent off, he did that himself by his own actions. Let’s get that completely clear.
Completely agree with this comment.
Perch did enough to ensure that the Ref saw but I think to his credit he did not stay down all the long. He was up pretty quick when he could have laid their for five minutes clutching his face and moaning. The question is if you want a penalty do you have to shout or claim for one. Andy went down as he caught the ball under his foot and knew he could not get a shot off. He knew he had a better shot of getting the penalty but he did not call for it he simply fell flat on his face.