"Is it a dive? Never in a million years. A dive is when you try to influence the referee, you throw your arms up and so on."
The quote above is what Tony Mowbray said following Aidan McGeady's yellow card for diving yesterday. I have a degree of sympathy with McGeady, we have seen in the past few days just how randomly the media can react to extremely similar incidents. After all what is a dive?
One can be clouted and then roll around and feign injury, even though there was a lot of contact this could be deemed diving. One can jump out of the way of a dangerous lunge in the box, there may be no contact but one may lose balance in trying to avoid the challenge, is this a dive? One may throw oneself to ground and in doing so mean that there is contact when there would have been none had one tried to stay on one's feet, is this a dive? Sometimes the referee won't give the free kick unless the player goes to ground, even if the foul is clear, so no wonder players make sure they hit the deck at times.
You get my point, there are shades of grey here, diving is no black and white thing most of the time. The strange thing for me is that the media ignore some of the blackest and clearest of dives from the likes of Owen, Gerrard, Ronaldo and Rooney, while much greyer cases like that of Eduardo are highlighted in the most unfair of manners. All we want is a bit of consistency and the media to show some brains, it isn't much to ask is it?
5 comments:
I am so fed up with the media and supporters of other teams making so many negative and ridiculously slanted comments about Arsenal right now that I cannot even debate the facts with them anymore.
All I want is for us to win the title this season so we can SHOVE IT DOWN ALL THEIR BLEEPING THROATS!!!
Sorry about the caps. That is the level of my ire right now.
Please Arsenal - destroy everyone you play for the rest of the season to vindicate the Gooners for all of their effort in supporting you.
Here here Rhino, I'm f-----g FUMING at the entire football world right now, for me it's SIEGE MENTALITY all the way! And our players had better be inspired by their manager taking a hit like he did at OT for them! No referee would ever have done that to Ferguson -- EVER! And imagine if they had, imagine how Ferguson would've reacted. Our manager behaved with class, dignity, grace and even humor.
I can feel the rage as well Rhino.
A lot of people seem to unquestioningly swallow the crap they hear and see on the tv/radio without even engaging their little grey cells.
It would be nice if we could stuff it down their throats.
What does it say about the Premier League when a manager who kicks a water bottle has more class than 70,000 other people in the stadium? It says that said manager got robbed, that's what.
If I read Rhino, Marcus and our distinguished host correctly... and I think that I do... then what they're saying is...
The damned gloves are off. From here on in, to hell with what everyone thinks about Arsenal. From here on in, it's scorched-earth policy. Screw the Geneva Convention: We won't be taking any prisoners to torture. (Come to think of it, isn't FIFA headquartered in Geneva?) We are going to be like General Sherman marching through Georgia. If there's a British equivalent to ol' William Tecumseh, go ahead and use him.
Shove it down their bloody throats indeed -- until those throats are, indeed, bloody! And Marcus was slightly off: We will not be IN a siege mentality, we will be GIVING one!
It's time to go V for Vendetta on their arses! You have guns? No, what you have are referees, and the hope that, when his whistle is blown to start, we're no longer standing, because if we are, you'll all be dead before he can blow for halftime!
We can be whipping boys... or WE CAN BE... GUNNERS! And gentlemen in England now a-bed shall think themselves accursed they were not here! We shall fight on the touchline. We shall fight in the box. We shall fight in the goalmouth. We shall never surrender! We fear nothing, not even fear itself! We choose to win the League, not because it is easy, but because it is hard! Mr. Wenger, tear down this wall! Yes we can! Yes we can! Give us a sign, Dennis, give us a sign! Shut up, Sven!
A little too much gung in my ho? I don't care!
Brilliant Uncle Mike, brilliant!
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