Football Diary 22

Football Diary

by Patrick O'Connor

THE job of being a football referee is becoming more difficult every day and recent controversy over who should and should not be sent off for two-footed tackles is not making things any easier.

Indeed, it's almost becoming a witch hunt by television as pundits pour over, frame by frame, every contentious tackle.

The recent spate of high profile red cards has catapulted the two-footed tackle into the spotlight and I thought the Wigan manager Roberto Martinez got it spot on with his comments in the The Independent newspaper at the weekend: “Two-footed challenges should be red cards, that should be the end of the debate. If you are a player and go into a challenge with both feet that should be a red card.”

The problem is that referees are not consistent in their decision-making and this is leading to managers and players getting het up about the issue.

In the recent Manchester City v Liverpool Carling Cup semi-final, City players and their boss Roberto Mancini were incensed when Glen Johnson was not sent off, especially after having seen City's Vincent Kompany red carded in the Manchester United FA Cup tie only a few days before.

Former referee Dermot Gallagher told BBC Radio 5 Live said Johnson should have walked for his tackle on Joleon Lescott.

Referee Lee Mason did not even award a free-kick but Gallagher said: “Everybody will accept it's a red card.”

Gallagher says he wants greater clarity on what is viewed as a dangerous tackle.

"God forbid, if Lescott had received that tackle, he would have had two broken legs," he said.

"We've got to get these people together, sit down and decide what is acceptable and what isn't - give the referees a little bit of licence, not the massive, grey area there is now.

"[They need] a little bit of licence to say: 'There is a borderline challenge, which on a given day, [depending]where you're stood and how it looks, could go either way.'"

The Manchester City coach David Platt did not feel either Kompany or Johnson should have been sent off.

Platt said he did not think Johnson's tackle was dangerous.

"Live in the game I don't think it was a case of it being dangerous necessarily. The problem is there's an inconsistency there.

"Vinny's sending off, I think everybody who has watched videos of it would say it shouldn't have [been a red card].

"Live in the game, can you excuse the ref for sending him off? Yes, because he's interpreted something.

"We feel as if we've been punished twice."

It is not easy being a referee, especially in the Premier League, but this current crisis can only be sorted out by the men in black doing their job better.

I see that the Arsenal manager Arsene Wenger has claimed football has “sold its soul” to television companies.

Wenger complained that Premier League bosses must intervene to ensure fixture scheduling was fair to clubs.

All five of Arsenal's games during January have been moved for the television cameras.

"I don't believe the Premier League has played, in the last month or the last year, a very fair role in the distribution of the fixtures," Wenger said.

It's not just the Premier League Arsene.

My own club Derby County play in the Championship and our home fixture against near neighbours Leicester City has just been switched from a Saturday, 3pm kick off to a Thursday night (7.45pm) to be shown live on Sky television.

This will be the first time in the many, many years I have been watching football that I shall be attending a football match on a Thursday night.

Am I happy about it – definitely not, as a traditionalist I much prefer my football on Saturdays. Can supporters or even clubs do anything about it – absolutely not.