[Football] Diving cheats - now Smalling

Guy Fawkes · Feb 12, 2018

It's not been mentioned yet but the game is only seeing these soft decisions and these dives because the rules were changed to such a degree that it has led to almost the complete loss of any physical contact between players inchallenges, etc...

The rules were brought in to protect the skillful players that would otherwise be targeted and kicked out of the game but the rules have meant its gone too far the other ways, instead of protecting those players to allow them to display that skill, it allows players to exaggerate any minimal contact and win a free kick or penalty

The rules need updating again to take it a way from this 'minimal contact = foul and he player is entitled to go down there' culture we have now and make players stay on their feet and actually show the fans who pay to see them what they ca actually do when they stay on their feet instead. It doesn't mean that the skillful players will start to get kicked again with no protection from the refs, but allow for more physical challenges again, like shoulder to shoulder type contact which seems to have been turned into a foul as the player on the end of it falls to the ground rather than trying to stay up and go forward any more. If they are being knocked over too easily then hard luck, they should have been stronger and tried to stay upright and carry on

Triggaaar · Feb 12, 2018

TWOCHOICEStom said:
To be fair, Schelotto's dive on Saturday was just as bad.

Napier's Knee said:
Yep, we're no innocents here. Hate it.

Stat Brother said:
Again, to me it seems very poor form to write all of that and not mention Murray.
We need to own our cheats before pointing the finger at everybody else's cheating players.

Within 5 replies of the OP, two posters have already commented on someone from our team diving, and then you rock up to complain that we're pointing the finger at others without taking responsibility for our own. Did you even read the other replies before getting it so wrong?

Stat Brother said:
As with this thread, always pointing the finger at other players and never their own

Bodian · Feb 12, 2018

Guy Fawkes said:
It's not been mentioned yet but the game is only seeing these soft decisions and these dives because the rules were changed to such a degree that it has led to almost the complete loss of any physical contact between players inchallenges, etc...

The rules were brought in to protect the skillful players that would otherwise be targeted and kicked out of the game but the rules have meant its gone too far the other ways, instead of protecting those players to allow them to display that skill, it allows players to exaggerate any minimal contact and win a free kick or penalty

The rules need updating again to take it a way from this 'minimal contact = foul and he player is entitled to go down there' culture we have now and make players stay on their feet and actually show the fans who pay to see them what they ca actually do when they stay on their feet instead. It doesn't mean that the skillful players will start to get kicked again with no protection from the refs, but allow for more physical challenges again, like shoulder to shoulder type contact which seems to have been turned into a foul as the player on the end of it falls to the ground rather than trying to stay up and go forward any more. If they are being knocked over too easily then hard luck, they should have been stronger and tried to stay upright and carry on

Yes, you're right. When I played, no-one ever went down because of a shoulder-to-shoulder challenge, or if you did you didn't complain about it. I do recall one instance where I was basically taken out by a shoulder barge, and the ref gave a free-kick. When the offender moaned that it was just shoulder-to-shoulder, the ref replied something like 'Yes, but you've got to make some attempt to get the ball not just to knock him over'. And that's they key to that sort of challenge I think - if it's a blatant deliberate barge/push/shove, fair enough - free kick. If it's a coming together - then let it go.

But what was odd on Saturday was that the ref let nearly everything else go, including some quite beefy challenges. At one point he weighed his hands out basically saying 50/50 so carry on. Which was why I was surprised by the penalty, it seemed so out of context with what had gone on before.

Stat Brother · Feb 12, 2018

Triggaaar said:
Within 5 replies of the OP, two posters have already commented on someone from our team diving, and then you rock up to complain that we're pointing the finger at others without taking responsibility for our own. Did you even read the other replies before getting it so wrong?

Both got a thumbs up from me, before I posted, unlike the OP who was pointing the finger at other players and not our own.

Triggaaar · Feb 12, 2018

Stat Brother said:
Both got a thumbs up from me, unlike the OP who was pointing the finger at other players and not our own.

But you said 'We need to own our cheats before pointing the finger at everybody else's cheating players'. Who is this 'we' you talk of? As a group of fans 'we' do call our own players when they dive, as is evident in this thread, yet you're claiming 'we' don't on the basis of a post by one person.

So if there's another game on tv, and we see someone dive, we should be able to post about it here without having you complain that we're not owning any dives from a Brighton player.

Bozza · Feb 12, 2018

Triggaaar said:
But you said 'We need to own our cheats before pointing the finger at everybody else's cheating players'. Who is this 'we' you talk of? As a group of fans 'we' do call our own players when they dive, as is evident in this thread, yet you're claiming 'we' don't on the basis of a post by one person.

We're not really though, are we?

Albion fans, like fans of all other clubs I'm aware of, deplore diving until it's one of their own. A few mentions on a messageboard is hardly calling a player out, letting players know that their actions are not considered OK.

"Everyone else is doing it" is largely the ruling mantra from fans, which is why other than a few posts on here, Albion fans would gladly take Murray being "entitled to go down" if it won us a penalty that secured us three points that helped keep us up.

Triggaaar · Feb 12, 2018

Bozza said:
We're not really though, are we?

Albion fans, like fans of all other clubs I'm aware of, deplore diving until it's one of their own.

After 6 replies to the OP, 3 of them were complaining about Schelotto's dive, so yes, we are.

A few mentions on a messageboard is hardly calling a player out, letting players know that their actions are not considered OK.

What, you want us to track Schelotto down to berate him? We see Zaha diving on a regular basis, and they have fans over here telling us it's not true, it hasn't happened. The behaviour of our fans on here is nothing like that. That's what I'm comparing us to. That doesn't mean we need to complain to the club or the FA because one of our players went down (nowhere near goal I might add).

"Everyone else is doing it" is largely the ruling mantra from fans, which is why other than a few posts on here, Albion fans would gladly take Murray being "entitled to go down" if it won us a penalty that secured us three points that helped keep us up.

But when Zaha does it on a weekly basis, like StatBro, you don't want us mentioning it on here?

World's gone mad.

Robinjakarta · Feb 12, 2018

Bodian said:
Yes, you're right. When I played, no-one ever went down because of a shoulder-to-shoulder challenge, or if you did you didn't complain about it. I do recall one instance where I was basically taken out by a shoulder barge, and the ref gave a free-kick. When the offender moaned that it was just shoulder-to-shoulder, the ref replied something like 'Yes, but you've got to make some attempt to get the ball not just to knock him over'. And that's they key to that sort of challenge I think - if it's a blatant deliberate barge/push/shove, fair enough - free kick. If it's a coming together - then let it go.

But what was odd on Saturday was that the ref let nearly everything else go, including some quite beefy challenges. At one point he weighed his hands out basically saying 50/50 so carry on. Which was why I was surprised by the penalty, it seemed so out of context with what had gone on before.

Seems from what I've seen that Bobby Madley can be a very good or bad referee - often in the same match. I think he's one of the youngest, which may at least partly explain his apparent inconsistency.

Weststander · Feb 12, 2018

JBizzle said:
Sadly, diving is such a massive part of a footballer's make-up now, even a centre-back like Smalling is giving it a go. So many fouls are given these days when a player is already diving when an opposing player makes contact, that it's not surprising that when Shelvey pulls out of the tackle, Smalling is already on his way to the floor. The problem is, despite all the posturing, the FA really don't care enough about it.

As an aside, Jese dived this weekend to "win" Stoke their penalty and the pundits call it "soft". It wasn't soft, he dived. The sooner people start consistently calling out divers as divers, the sooner it will start to go away. Or not.

I'd love to see all refs pepper the divers with cards.

Rooney (not averse to cheating himself) said on Sky last Monday night that the head of PL referees, made it plain to all 20 clubs last August that a change has taken effect from this season - looking for contact to win a free kick/penalty is now a mandatory yellow card and a free kick to the other team.

They need to comprehensively enforce that.

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[Football] Diving cheats - now Smalling

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