Is football no longer a "mans game"

eagle eye

I'm really going off the game. The only game I watched the weekend was Rovers vs Spurs and thats because I support Blackburn. I really couldn't be bothered watching any other games anymore because of all the ridiculous diving and soft free kicks. Its become a total joke imo. If you ever watch the MLS you won't see anything like whats going on in the Premier League or Europe for that matter. Same with the A-League in Australia, you don't get this ridiculous stuff.

Bodhisopha

Man is a crafty, underhanded beast. Football is more a man's game now than ever before.

Son Of A Vidic

When was football ever a man's game?

#15

Football is completely ridiculous in comparison to pretty much every other sport. I can't think of any other sport where widespread cheating is accepted across the board.
Other sports have problems, but a lot of them stem from backroom politics. Football has almost as many problems on the field as it does off it.

du Maurier

homerjay2005 wrote: »

first off, this is not a thread to start accusing players of being divers or a cheat, so please please lets not turn this into a nani v suarez debate please. i would ask the mods to step in, if this becomes the case, this is not my intention so please respect this. i am talking here about the reaction of players, fans, pundits and refs alike in general.

so anyway, this thread is inspired by yesterdays chelsea game v qpr, but this is something ive had the opinion for a while, football is not longer a mans game. gone are the days of honesty in players, crunching tackles, players getting up and walking away from tackles. fans now are looking for every single decision to be given fouls and i believe this has now got to epic-ally worryingly proportions. football is becoming a non contact sport.

i hate chelsea, i think they get their fair share of reffing decisions, but yesterdays first half was a joke. and this is just one game, the freshest in my mind.

the penalty was a joke, Luiz barely touched the QPR player and he just took to the floor.

the red card on boswinga was a farce, it was a foul but only just, but not a red. he grabbed his shorts and down went SWP. must be amazing strength in the material if a mans short are pulled strong enough to bring him down, yet the shorts stay in the same position.

the red on drogba the same, it was a yellow at most. but for some reason, the amount of reds coming into the game for this, has grown over the past 3 years. have challenges got worse? no f*cking way. its a shift in attitude of all involved with the game and whats acceptable and not.

the sad thing for me is that lee dixon on MOTD2 said all 3 decisions were correct. has the football world really come to this? pundits massively influence the mindset of people and this then translates into the stands. even chelsea fans behind that goal in loftus road, shouted for 3 penalties and while all 3 were dubious, if fair play and consistency were shown by the ref, they should have had at least one.

the reality is, the ref got them 3 calls right, but the 3 calls in the first half wrong. BUT, he showed no consistency for incidents that were pretty much similar and that is another huge problem, there is no consistency in the rules. bad decisions by refs are leading to more bad decisions as players then start believing they should get these sort of fouls. chelsea players will go down that bit easier in a follow up game i am sure, it even happened in the second half already yesterday. and it will happen to every team. likewise the next time a united forward will be through on goal and has his arm held, he will be entitled to just fall over and so on and so on. its sad that this is now accepted in football and everybody cant man up and just get on with the game.

is this " he went in with 2 feet" argument valid of a pile of crap? is it officially written in the rule book? we hear pundits saying, he went over the ball. again, is it another overused cliche?

jamie carragher deserves great credit for last weekend when he totally ignored a rash 2 footed challenge from welbeck, if we had more players like carragher, football would be a better place, but sadly there is not. you would rarely see the likes of him, scholes, giggs and all the other players in the mid 30's bracket trying to con players, they are of a dying breed though.

and the sad aspect is, that while ive not seen the challenge on long, i believe that was a shocking tackle that went unpunished, so again, where is the consistency. yet all villa management can talk about is the "soft" red they did get.

i was at the united v city game and ive become disillusioned with the amount of soft frees that have come into the game. im sure that thread has debated everything, so i wont go any further. im actually considering stopping going to games due to the lack of proper honesty and above all else officiating in games.

has the beautiful game now become a game where every tackle is a potential card and a foul? and is football gone so pc, that the laws of the game as it was over 100 years ago, are now virtually dead?

thoughts please? football is trending in a very bad direction.

The referees can be caught between a rock and hard place with decisions, especially as the suits upstairs want the game to be played a particular way - if the refs are opposed to this design sooner or later they'll have to kiss their jobs goodbye. A shame, but as you say, it's the way it's going.

PARlance

homerjay2005 wrote: »

ive been playing football for 20 years and some of that at a very decent level when i was younger. as a defender and somebody who hopes to be a ref in the next 2 or 3 years, i think you need to respect that people are entitled to opinion with resorting to that crap. i dont think drogba went in to injure anybody and this is the type of attitude that sums up the reason why i believe football is going to s*it.

I'd hate to see you becoming a ref homerjay, and I say that as a few instances come flashing back were teammates & opposition players have had legs broken a few yards away from me.

It can be a man's game without someone going into a tackle with two feet off the ground.
In fact, it's been my experience, that a proper "man" would rarely, if ever, resort to such a tackle.
It's generally the spineless fu*kers that jump in like that.

As a ref, If you let a tackle like that go unpunished, it's almost certain a game will descend into a farce and the likelihood of serious injuries sky rocket.
I've played in too many of those games.

I've played at "decent levels" and it doesn't make a difference, a lad playing for a pub team should have the cop on to know you don't jump in with 2 feet thus having no control or ability to change direction of a tackle.

It doesn't matter if Drogba was trying to injure someone or not.
If you break someone's leg with a 2 footed challenge, saying you didn't mean it doesn't really fix the leg in my experience
As a ref, would you be able to know who's going in with intent or not? You're a mind-reader if so!

Blatter

If there was a specific panel created that had the power to judge that a player dived during a game, and introduce retrospective disciplinary action(ideally a one game ban imo) things would automatically improve.

It puzzles me that this is rarely suggested as I don't really see the problem with it. Lots of players may get banned initially but fewer and fewer would attempt simulation and it would eventually be weeded out, by and large.

PARlance

^ Made that point earlier blatter, I'm not one for video evidence stopping the game, but if cheats like this can be found out after the game, it should be used to ban them. Problem would be quickly leave the game

AstonMartin

Newcastle...

Stoke...

Arsenal...

end of

homerjay2005

AstonMartin wrote: »

Newcastle...

Stoke...

Arsenal...

end of

what? this thread is not about refs if you are saying bad decisions affect every team, this is about how the game has gone and the fact that its now turning into a non contact sport.

sneakyST

homerjay2005 wrote: »

ive been playing football for 20 years and some of that at a very decent level when i was younger. as a defender and somebody who hopes to be a ref in the next 2 or 3 years, i think you need to respect that people are entitled to opinion with resorting to that crap. i dont think drogba went in to injure anybody and this is the type of attitude that sums up the reason why i believe football is going to s*it.

Hj if you do become a ref you are going to get a rude awakening. Most players don't know the laws of the game. Mr. Foy's decisions were all spot on. End of

ironbluedun

ITS BEEN ABOUT 25 YEARS SINCE PROFESSIONAL FOOTBALL AT THE HIGHEST LEVEL WAS A MANS GAME.

FatRat

This has nothing to do with bad tackles and physical play.... but a prime example of how cards are given out like candy these days.

Balotelli scores against United. He must have been delighted about it, first goal, possibly the most important match of the season. Then, to show how happy he is and to add some humour to the game, he takes up his shirt to show another shirt saying "Why always me?".

I was horridly offended and he deserved the yellow card he got for it. I mean taking up your shirt to display another shirt of the same colour with a funny caption??????

Ref was spot on....... Although, I probably would have given a red.

homerjay2005

sneakyST wrote: »

Hj if you do become a ref you are going to get a rude awakening. Most players don't know the laws of the game. Mr. Foy's decisions were all spot on. End of

the laws are perhaps the problem then. and no, they were not spot on. the penalty was soft and the first red was not a red. the drogba red would not have been a red 3 or 4 years ago.

DoctorGonzo08

FatRat wrote: »

This has nothing to do with bad tackles and physical play.... but a prime example of how cards are given out like candy these days.

Balotelli scores against United. He must have been delighted about it, first goal, possibly the most important match of the season. Then, to show how happy he is and to add some humour to the game, he takes up his shirt to show another shirt saying "Why always me?".

I was horridly offended and he deserved the yellow card he got for it. I mean taking up your shirt to display another shirt of the same colour with a funny caption??????

Ref was spot on....... Although, I probably would have given a red.

And yet Rooney is allowed to remove the bag off his head before a game and never gets a card?

Scharner got a yellow for the same thing, and McCarthy calling for him to be banned. The rule has gotten completely lost in translation.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but I believe it was in Euro 04 that the yellow card was called for players taking their shirt off. Because the shirts at the time were a two ply mesh underneath when players removed their top it took ages for them to get it back on. Hence the card was introduced to discourage time wasting, not for celebrating.

Scharner and Mario didn't offend anyone and don't deserve a card for celebrating. Adebayor (City v Arsenal) was a yellow card and deserved banning.

DoctorGonzo08

ironbluedun wrote: »

ITS BEEN ABOUT 25 YEARS SINCE PROFESSIONAL FOOTBALL AT THE HIGHEST LEVEL WAS A MANS GAME.

I disagree with this, mainly because of Lawro's comments at the weekend. Hutton went in to seriously injury Long with a scissors tackle. NO card, which Lawro says 10 years ago a tackle like that would have got you a new contract?

Players like Pele were destroyed in the 'good aul days' for what? Exceptionally talented player who goes out for some nobody to make a name for himself by trying to break his legs?

Bodhisopha

DoctorGonzo08 wrote: »

And yet Rooney is allowed to remove the bag off his head before a game and never gets a card?

Scharner got a yellow for the same thing, and McCarthy calling for him to be banned. The rule has gotten completely lost in translation.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but I believe it was in Euro 04 that the yellow card was called for players taking their shirt off. Because the shirts at the time were a two ply mesh underneath when players removed their top it took ages for them to get it back on. Hence the card was introduced to discourage time wasting, not for celebrating.

Scharner and Mario didn't offend anyone and don't deserve a card for celebrating. Adebayor (City v Arsenal) was a yellow card and deserved banning.

Deserved a medal. Greatest celebration of all time.

Dotrel

Thing I don't get is (whether a booking for shirt removal is justified or not) it is now within the laws of the game. So why do players keep doing it?

Is it that hard to just remember to celebrate without removing your shirt? I'm fairly certain I've seen cases of players getting red cards where one of the yellows was for shirt removal, so try explaining that to your manager.

Pepe LeFrits

homerjay2005 wrote: »

i dont think drogba went in to injure anybody

Doesn't matter, it was still a reckless tackle.

wandatowell

keano_afc wrote: »

Football has been like this for years though, and its only getting worse. The face that there is zero respect for the ref plays into it too. Until they start bringing in long bans for diving/simulation nothing will change.

I got a feeling the PFA would have a **** storm if the F.A. came out and started banning players for diving. Its basically calling the players cheats and their enlarged ego's wouldnt not accept it.

FatRat

DoctorGonzo08 wrote: »

And yet Rooney is allowed to remove the bag off his head before a game and never gets a card?

Scharner got a yellow for the same thing, and McCarthy calling for him to be banned. The rule has gotten completely lost in translation.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but I believe it was in Euro 04 that the yellow card was called for players taking their shirt off. Because the shirts at the time were a two ply mesh underneath when players removed their top it took ages for them to get it back on. Hence the card was introduced to discourage time wasting, not for celebrating.

Scharner and Mario didn't offend anyone and don't deserve a card for celebrating. Adebayor (City v Arsenal) was a yellow card and deserved banning.

Sorry I can't tell if you picked up on my sarcasm or not.... it's hard to show it online.

I was saying it was joke that he got carded.

DoctorGonzo08

FatRat wrote: »

Sorry I can't tell if you picked up on my sarcasm or not.... it's hard to show it online.

I was saying it was joke that he got carded.

Haha. I did. I was agreeing with you. I was just wondering if anyone else could confirm the origins of the rule. Whatever about Mario's card, Scharner's was ridic. He was showing off a tshirt his son made for him to wear! No place in football for a proud father, but plenty of room for a buck tooth biting cheat

homerjay2005

apologies if this was posted elsewhere, i dont check all threads.

insane red card and sums up, what is wrong in football right now. where has common sense disappeared to?

SlickRic

referees like that are little Hitlers.

that makes me want to smash something.

#15

SlickRic wrote: »

referees like that are little Hitlers.

Worse than Hitler. You wouldn't find Hitler playing jungle music at 3 in the morning.

mike65

Seen it all now.