Arsene Wenger has welcomed rule changes which will be introduced this season in relation to simulation (diving), player and manager behaviour, and the offside rule, but has hit out at at the early start to this Premier League season.
For a run down on what’s changing, this BBC article tells you what’s what, and the measures have met with general approval from the Arsenal manager.
“I feel quite positive about them,” he said. “The first concerns, part of it, my behaviour because it is technical area behaviour and you want ourselves to behave in the proper way. So we have to look at ourselves first.
“The second one is about simulation. I am a big, big fan of that because I feel it is important to help the referees so that they know when the players go down that it is really a foul.
“Anyway what is good is that with all the camera angles it will be more difficult to simulate and get away with it.”
And while he declared himself in favour of the new offside law, he urged the games authorities to go one step further.
“Look it makes sense, the only problem with that is that it comes down to interpretation and that will be a debate maybe.
“For me the next step on the video front would be the offside rule.”
However, the decision to start the Premier League season a week earlier than usual was the subject of criticism from Wenger, who claimed none of the clubs were consulted in advance about the move.
“I think it is a massive mistake for England to start one week earlier because you have no Christmas break,” he said.
“I don’t know who came up with the idea that one game less at Christmas deserves one week holiday less, especially when you have a European Championship after the season.
“The difficulty nowadays is to find holidays for the players. In the FIFA rules, you have to give four weeks holiday to your players. Soon, if you want to do that, you start the season with the youth team because all your players should be on holiday when you start the season.
“I don’t know why we weren’t consulted,” he said. “These kinds of decisions are taken in meetings where we are not involved.”
Seems like the offside law is “clarified” before every single season. The ambiguity and arbitrary nature of this kind of offside, where a player is deemed to be influencing the defence without actually touching the ball, will never be eliminated.
Some may see it as a step back but I would really like to get rid of offside rule or introduce the video replays.
Wouldn’t the game be much more enjoyable and interesting to watch if we get rid of it? Hockey-type scores?
We would also get a split between Chelsea-level parking the bus, and Stoke-level hoof-the-ball, as one team defends and one attacks, with no restrictions as to where they can be.
No thanks.
Why don’t we do away with rules entirely? Embrace the American ‘football’ style savagery and free-for-all; in fact, we do we have laws in society at all?
The thing with replay is you want to minimize how long they take. If soccer introduced lots of replay breaks, it would be a huge financial gain for them (which is bad for us) as that would really interrupt the natural flow of a game. American football is cool, but you spend MOST of the time watching replays, commercials, and players standing around – not including halftime. For a proper football match, it takes ~2 hours from kickoff to the final whistle, including the half. That’s 90 minutes of football in 2 hours, rather than a mind-breaking 11 minutes of… Read more »
At one point, they trialled no offside in junior levels. They found teams just camped 5 players around their own goal and 5 at the other end, with big hoofs in between. The idea had been to stretch the game more, but it just ended up making the boxes even more crowded.
It was a mistake to ever go to this wishy-washy system where somebody can be standing offside and the ball gets played up past them and no offside is called.
If people want to stand offside and get called on it all game because they’re lazy sods we shouldn’t change the rules just to accomodate them. They should change their style of play.
The old rule – if you’re offside and the ball is played to or past you, it gets called – worked fine and was unambiguous.
“The old rule – if you’re offside and the ball is played to or past you, it gets called – worked fine and was unambiguous”…. Could not agree more – black or white as opposed to interpretation. When the offside rule was amended (with the best or whatever intention) it was inevitable bigger teams with ‘bigger’ managers and atmosphere would play a role in influencing such decisions. Particulalrly interesting in the BBC example is a Manchester United offside, leading to a goal, which should have been offside regardless. (By the by, can we quit the assinine comparisions to American sports… Read more »
The ambiguity was introduced to encourage more goal scoring and make games more exciting.
EPL players have less holidays than teachers.
Good!
Give footballers teacher’s holidays!!!
And give teachers footballers’ salary.
then they can teach em the offside rule wiv time to spare
If only there was some way we could remunerate them for such long hours
Yes they must do at least 11 hours a week and some of that in the evening or weekends. Hope they’re getting double bubble for a Sunday and Time off in lieu.
My work once told me to take a week off in lieu.
So I went and sat in the toilet for 7 days.
They earn way more. duh
Doesnt everyone..
“…The second one is about simulation. I am a big, big fan of that”
WENGER IN SHOCK DIVING ADMISSION, FANS “FUMING”, PUNISHMENT EXPECTED “ANY DAY NOW”
Wenger has told the media he expects Wilshere to be back in training in two weeks, match-ready in four weeks. That’s great news!
Yep, from experience a hairline fibia fracture is nowhere near as bad as ligament damage. Match ready in 4 weeks sounds a bit optimistic but hey who knows what magic our medical team can do these days.
In Shad We Trust
I’m quite concerned about this: “I don’t know why we weren’t consulted,” he said. “These kinds of decisions are taken in meetings where we are not involved.” It’s utterly bewildering (but not at the same time) that the FA and the media think it’s feasible to hold meetings about issues which directly affect the clubs and do this behind the clubs backs. I know the FA are a crumbling pile of freeze-dried shite and the media are in the top 3 darkest industries in the world it simply is farcical, but now Wenger has spoken out in such a damning… Read more »
Is that you Santi… No
Who’s the other 2 dark industries in your top 3?
Wenger’ll probably get banned for a few games for bringing the game into disrepute by blowing the whistle on the FA.
Does anyone have a link to a website other than the BBC?
Any particular subject or is this a goatse request?
Covering the same stuff as the BBC article linked above. And thank you for making me google ‘goatse’. No really, I can’t thank you enough.
Rumor is he’s looking to leave Bayern Munich. Can we stretch the squad to make room?
I have several. Which would you like?
“Soon, if you want to do that, you start the season with the youth team….”
Every cloud has a silver lining. In this case, if everyone were to field a team of kids Alan Hansen’s head would explode.
I’ll believe it when these dimwits actually enforce the simulating players. Chelsea would be so screwed.
The new rules sound spooky and wierd to me. Especially the new off-side rule