Arsene Wenger has hit out at players who overreact to challenges but admitted that his own team are as capable of hamming it up as any other.
Clearly the issue is fresh for the Arsenal boss, having just played against Liverpool and Sp*rs, conceding penalties to dives in both games. Gareth Bale is the only player to have been booked more than once this season for diving, while Luis Suarez is the archetypal diver – not only does he go down under minimal, and sometimes no, contact, he then rolls around on the floor as if his leg has been snapped in two.
As Arsenal fans we sadly know that if a player’s leg is snapped in two he rarely does any kind of rolling around at all, and this kind of reaction to a tackle is, essentially, acting. Yes, football is entertainment as well as sport, but aside from the odd penalty and a card for an opponent, there are no prizes given out for these acts of callow thespianism.
“It annoys me when that sort of thing happens but I know it can also happen with one of my players,” said Wenger.
“For example, Suarez got a penalty against us at Anfield last week that was no penalty because nobody touched him.
“Everyone who has played football can understand that players try to win a penalty when they push the ball too far and go down although nobody has touched them.
“But when they roll down their sock, take out the shinpad and react as though they have been kicked like mad, that is a bit overboard.
“When you face that situation with one of your own players, you talk to them. But they already know.”
The issue is in focus again as Arsenal face Newcastle tonight. On the opening day of the season new signing Gervinho was sent off after tickling Joey Barton’s face. The self-styled hard man fell to the floor as if he’d been poleaxed by Oscar (eh?! eh?!) de la Hoya, and Wenger says the Ivorian won’t make the same mistake again.
At Newcastle, he had a bad response to provocation from Barton,” he said.
“He was shocked because he felt he didn’t do a lot. But I think he learned his lesson in the first game.”
We can but hope, but until football takes a zero tolerance approach to cheats like Bale and Suarez, and uses video footage to retrospectively charge and punish these kinds of incidents, then sadly nothing much is going to change.
As much as we criticise referees, it’s often only with the benefit of replays that the cheating becomes apparent, and not to use this technology in a positive way is down to that big, fat, corrupt Luddite in charge of FIFA. A ref’s job is tough enough, they have to make decisions in split seconds, and when you read idiots like Bale actually admitting to diving then surely they need all the help they can get.
You can be quite sure that once a few players get banned for ‘simulation’, as they so kindly put it, others will think twice before they go to ground so quickly.
But we won’t hold our breath over its implementation.
I heard that the Olympic diving team has offered Suarez a spot for the coming games.
I read somewhere Rooney, Bale, etc are facing dilemmas this coming summer as well, something about Team GB, diving and gold medals.
Wasn’t ‘Shrek’ the one who wrote a book or something about how he hates diving? Or is it Mr Scouse Muppet, Gerrard?
Uh, Shrek is a scouse muppet too..
Players are punished retrospectively
for unseen bad tackles why not for
clear dives or any other form of
cheating such as Pedersen taking a
corner to himself.
To be fair I don’t think Bale or Suarez
would have been charged because
it was a fine line.The point is they would not risk doing it if they were caught out after the game.
I am not sure what the league can do
about Goofy Suarez thrice weekly
broken ankle but some action should
be taken.
This is a terrible poem.
Doubt this will ever happen. UEFA are dicks, FIFA are dicks and aliens don’t exist. What’s not new? They’re too busy poking their thumbs up their asses to realize anything.
Bale doesn’t dive, he just protects his career. What a load of horseshit! Never bothers correcting the ref though does he….
Ref “Pelanty!”
Bale “No ref! I wasn’t fouled! I protected my career! Don’t give me a penalty, give me a boy scout badge!!”
Bale is a mug. Even in all those pictures of him supposedly protecting himself. Maybe someone should tell him that to protect yourself when you fall you put your arms down to break the fall not throw them up in the air like a film star evading an exploding car!!
No chimp boy you are diving to cheat not to protect yourself you twat!
When I go down playing footie, I actually push my hands to the floor if possible so the impact lands on my hands more than my body, where it might really hurt. Maybe Bale just takes it better when he falls on his fucking chest. Who knows, he’s a chimp, you don’t expect him to be smart.
That picture of Bale is amazing, Going down with no players within 1 metre of him.
Like the picture too, it somehow conveys the true message “dive responsibly”… 😉
Here in Australia we had someone retrospectively banned for diving for 2 matches. There was conjecture and as far as I remember FIFA wasn’t happy. It is definitely the way of the future. It’s hard enough for refs, people actively deceiving them must make it damn near impossible.
Yeah, seems arseblog and the aussie federation r the only ones on same page.(also sbs our no. 1 world game media broadcaster have been saying similar things for as long as I remember – 20+ yrs). Just reminds me of that saying about absolute power corrupting… Fuck I hate FIFA
And Cesec yesterday?
He’s contracted Buesquetitis.
..or Busquetitis – pfft.
At least it wasn’t Alveritis (worst diver on the Catalan Cunts!)
If someone in the Camp Nou snaps a bubble with their chewing gum he thinks it’s an assasination attempt!
I hate it when pundits, ex refs, players and the press analyse incidents, like the Bale and Suarez ones and offer the cheats a get out by saying there may have been minimal contact. Contact isn’t justification to dive, there is contact all over the pitch, we should be talking about ‘sufficient contact’ which facts the players momentum. Bale tried to justify his dive by saying he tries to get out of the way. What bollocks, if that was the case why did he leave his leg dangling when he could easily have jumped over Szchezny. He should be investigated… Read more »
Pires. Oh wait. That was ok/never seen by Arsene.
the architect of the dive in England arguably came from Klinsmann and I can’t remember who he played for?
Spud mug,……
fuck off back to the lane you lillywhite cunt
MIND THE SHHHHHHHH
I also thing Arsene is correct, there are no oscars in football, today anyway. I found a player called Oscar Fox but he was born in 1889, so I doubt he’s playing anymore.
Think not thing
Last thing we need is retrospective punishments for ‘simulation’
We all know it will only be implemented against us
Wenger has previously admitted that Pires dived. But there were no theatrics involved. Everyone claims for a penalty when they are brought down. Everyone!! But those that resort to theatrics for gettin a penalty shud be condemned.
So dragging your foot towards a player who isn’t making a tackle like Pires did v Pompey, Wellbeck did recently isn’t theatrics?
Pires, Rooney, Bale, Owen, C.Ronaldo, Drogba. They have all gone down under a challenge. It’s when they initiate the contact that its a bought penalty.
Nobody’s defending Pires for what was about his only ever dive during his entire Arsenal career.
Other players, Bale and Rooney spring to mind, do it on a consistent basis and don’t get labelled the way Pires did.
Pires’ dive vs Portsmouth was in 2003. He’s played for three clubs since he left us, yet it still gets brought up.
Gerrard, Lampard and Rooney regulary dive but the media still plough the line about it being a foreign disease. That’s view had shifted a little in the wake of countless incidents of diving by British players, so now it is a problem foreign players brought to our game. I can only assume they had some time travelling machine and popped back to the 70’s and infected Rodney Marsh and Mickey Thomas.
I would quite like to see Walcott go down a bit easier than he does sometimes. He often seems to be fouled in the box and play on, then it comes to nothing. I admire the honesty but if you are actually touched and are put off balance it’s sometimes better to just go down as the resulting shot is usually off target or not powerful enough. I do hate when players go down under next to no contact or no contact at all. Eboue was particularly annoying for this. Though I couldn’t say we don’t have any divers, I… Read more »
What a coincidence that monkey boy likes to protect his career inside the 18 yard box 😉 He doesn’t save his legs if that happens around midfield. Amazing the extra dangers to ones career all those painted lines present. The FA should launch an investigation!
I think this is Wenger being clever, he is clearly referring to the last two dives in games against us to try to get the ref’s attention to the game tonight. and he is right. Far too often arsenal don’t get pens that we deserve in games, while our opposition kick & elbow our players, & yes sometimes our players are too honest in the box. if theo or van persie went down a little easier wen they’ve been fouled we might be a little higher up the table, perhaps 3-4 pts ahead of spurs. Who knows? We might even… Read more »
Whatever happens tonight it will be all the better that that cunt Barton isn’t with Newcastle anymore!
I don’t have a problem with people protecting themselves by taking evasive action if they then try to tell the referee. I think we can all applaud Robbie Fowler for trying to do exactly that against us at Highbury a few years ago. Sadly the ref didn’t listen to him, Fowler then did his best to give Seaman a chance to save it, which Safe Hands duly did, only for Spice Boy MacAteer to drive in the rebound and celebrate like it was the best goal in the world. I don’t remember Fowler congratulating him. Despite his goal scoring record… Read more »
I really don’t understand all this praise given to Fowler. He still shot the penalty and it was scored eventually. If he really wanted to be “fair” he’d have deliberately shot it out from the penalty.
Well he had to maintain a certain professionalism, under the circumstances he did all he could. Only MacAteer ran in like a loony to score what was effectively a tame penalty. Fowler did his best to disguise the plan, MacAteer was a twat. Anyway, it was just a point about Fowler trying to tell the ref not to give the penalty regardless of the consequent style in which it was taken ! I don’t believe any other high profile player in such a high profile game has done that since. Of course, I could be wrong but it’s hardly prevelant.… Read more »
I can swear that’s exactly what i was thinking. Take a look at this season alone we had song serve some time at dirty foreigners prison for stamping on joey zaza. And if what zaza did wasn’t raise his hands to gervinho then what is? And then it comes down to English players. Both terry and garry cahill have had red cards cancelled yet i remember some years back we had an appeal for that and were told only in cases of mistaken identity can a card be transferred to a teammate but can not be cancelled, i think it… Read more »
You know, having an award ceremony at the end of the season for diving and cheating might not be a bad idea! It will draw public attention to the issue and highlight the players that are doing it most frequently, and give us all a laugh in the process!
If a player like suarez gets a clean sweep at these awards (best dive, best over-reaction to contact, best feign of injury, most racist bastard) then how many referees will pay attention to him the next season!
It needs some more thought but it might work! Thoughts?
Supported
The answer is simple. Their SHOULD be an oscars for diving! Or something similar. A big monthly/weekly award for best dive. Voted bu fans perhaps. This will grow in popularity and could even attract corporate sponsorship. Before you know it, EVERY fan will be checking to see who’s won the latest “best dive” award. This will tarnish reputations and make players known as divers. If this doesn’t make players want to stop it will at least make refs keep a closer eye on divers. Also thanks to Gerrard, Bale, Rooney and Suarez; it will be an award we never win,… Read more »
People seem to have forgotten about Oscar Cardozo. He’s certenly an Oscar.
We can start the award by ourselves and before you know it’s all over the media world. All we need do to create a web page or have an account on twitter or facebook, create awareness among football blogs and sites and we are on, those culprits will surely stop if they win more than several times.