Let them dive, but make the right decision

Roar Pro

By Scott B, 4 Nov 2008 The Crowd is a Roar Pro

Tagged:: referees, UEFA, video replays

Diving is an Olympic sport, only to be seen every four years. However, footballers sometimes get confused. What happened over the weekend is not uncommon in world football. Players are paid to win matches. And some will do this at any cost. Fair enough.

Before we all go on a witch-hunt, and start lighting torches, let’s not forget what a bad decision it was by the referee. A professional.

Now, you can jump up and down and call people cheats and acting un-Australian, but it was just a bad decision.

UEFA President Michel Platini has been toying with ideas for how to stop this, along with shirt pulling, for over the past two years. Platini’s solution? Two extra assistants; one behind each goal line.

Michel Platini: “The goal is to have one referee with more eyes. We do not want to change the philosophy of the game – we do not want to have two or three referees.”

This has recently been trailed at UEFA U-19 qualifiers in Slovenia. No video replays, no extra officials on the pitch.

It sounds like a positive solution. If UEFA continues trials, and the system becomes accepted, then other confederates will follow suit.

Everybody is talking about punishing the player in the Adelaide situation, but what about the referee.

Graham Poll was sent straight to the Championship after his World Cup effort. Perhaps the referee in question needs a week-long vacation.

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The Crowd Says (17) | Page 1 of Comments

dasilva said | November 4th 2008 @ 9:09am | Report comment

It’s like blaming police for crime. Yes the authority has responsibility to stamp it out and catch the criminals but doesn’t mean the criminals aren’t complete jerks/immoral/cheats etc. It certainly ain’t “fair enough” for players to dive just like it ain’t “fair enough” that people break the laws of the country. This “let them dive” attitude is crap and there shouold be a public humiliation for divers until they get the point. Perhaps the public ridicule will also serve as a deterrant along with getting caught.

Something tells me that the public humiliation will be more effective deterrant then the risk of getting a yellow card from a referee.

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oikee said | November 4th 2008 @ 9:39am | Report comment

How to win friends and influience people, start taking dives, this is one sure way to lose the aussie public.

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Millster said | November 4th 2008 @ 9:46am | Report comment

I could not be more against this article. Football is taking an ever-stronger stance against diving world-wide and while there is a long way to go, we are going in the right direction. The divers are the players, and therefore they should be the subject of scrutiny and sanctions in relation to this behaviour.

As Oikee says from his League background, if we don’t face this, we will lose the public.

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oikee said | November 4th 2008 @ 10:05am | Report comment

Even worse Millster than taking the dive, remember that guy on the streatcher and once he got to the sideline he got off and ran back out. I think that was more funny than anything else. But yes i agree with what you have said, world-wide you need to rid the game of this. Thing about it is we get to replay it over and over, some guy diving through the air not being touched and the ref running in to give the penalty to him. Oh the Shame, bad sportsmanship or as i like to call it, diving for the dollar.

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Matt said | November 4th 2008 @ 12:14pm | Report comment

One thing I haven’t seen mentioned is the role the Melbourne defender (Vargas?) played in this.

Yes, diving is terrible, repeat to ad nauseum, but it’s hardly a new thing and something players must deal with.

I was speaking to a Portugese friend who was defending diving, saying it’s a skill along with beating a player while dribbling or pace. Basically if you are tricky enough to maneuvre the ball, cause the defender to attempt a tackle but miss, then why not go to ground?

Vargas should have held his ground and not swung the leg in. Okay, he did not catch Cristiano, but that’s not the point. By sticking his leg in whilst inside the box, he opened the possibility up of committing a foul.

It’s not RIGHT in an idealistic view of the game, but in reality, all defenders should be doing their utmost to a) not concede a foul and b) not get yourself in a position where a player could dive from your trailing body part.

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Lazza said | November 4th 2008 @ 1:04pm | Report comment

I just hope all those Cricket nations don’t boot us out of World Cricket because of our “win at all costs’ mentality.

Matt, good point. Same as Grosso in the WC. If Lucas had stayed on his feet there would have been no penalty. Just don’t put yourself in that position.

At least Cristiano, generous spirit that he is, gave Melbourne their own penalty. He ‘wacked’ Vargas right in front of the ref!

I could almost hear him saying “just give the big sook a penalty’. I am a one-eyed Adelaide supporter though.

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Millster said | November 4th 2008 @ 1:09pm | Report comment

Hang on lets not stop there with Grosso / Neill. I was upset as anyone at the time and for 2 years thought there was – at least in part – simulation involved in that loss to Italy. But recently I looked at the event again on YouTube and I’ve totally changed my mind. Neill goes down, and he also moves his arm to trap Grosso’s legs. Yes Grosso made sure that the ref saw him go down. But it was absolutely a foul – and quite a cynical one at that by Neill.

Oikee – the guy on the stretcher thing is frustrating yes, and sometimes game-playing to slow down a passage of play. But at least its not as catastrophic as a dive in the penalty area. So as previously written I’d be targetting that first. Hey and lets keep everything in perspective too. In our code, at least as far as I know, no star player has stuck his fingers deliberately into anothers pie-hole!

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Lazza said | November 4th 2008 @ 1:22pm | Report comment

Millster,

The WC game against Italy was an emotional night and a lot of Football fans have changed their mind now. I made the same point about Lucas at the time and almost got beaten up!

Why is it that those people who are the least interested in Football, who never watch it or have a kind word to say, are the ones most ‘upset’ when it comes to diving? I don’t think they hate divers, they love them!

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Millster said | November 4th 2008 @ 2:13pm | Report comment

Lazza – spot on re your last paragraph. People don’t start with reality. They start with a stereotype. And then they look for those one-in-a-thousand examples to justify those stereotypes.

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dasilva said | November 4th 2008 @ 4:57pm | Report comment

I don’t mind too much that if another person fouls you, you go to ground (as long as you don’t roll around and make it look like your in heaps of pain). The reality is that if you stay on your feet no referee will give you the foul even if it is a foul. Which links to my belief that dirty physical play and diving are interlink. If people stop making professional fouls and getting away with it, players will stop diving for the most part. If players are getting fouled and not receiving it then that will encourage the player to exagerrate the foul and dive.

However nothing excuses falling on the ground when there is zero contact. That’s just unsportmanship as the only point in doing that is to send the player off or win the penalty when there is no foul.

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