Conspiracy theories are attempts to shift the blame

Strangely, I still remember the name of the first player I ever sent off although it was half a century ago and yet I have completely forgotten the names of all the others who I have sent off since. 

The incident that led to the dismissal was slightly unusual. My attention was on the play when I heard a commotion behind me. I turned to find a player with his hands round an opponents throat trying to throttle him. This was brought back to me last week when I read a story about Oliver Kahn, Germany's giant goalkeeping hero of last summer. It seems there is a side to Kahn we didn't see during the World Cup, for he has punched and even high- kicked opponents during matches. His behaviour was brought into focus however, when thousands of fans at a Bundesliga game, witnessed Kahn
apparently trying to strangle the opposing Bayer Leverkusen striker.

After sending in the misconduct report about my own strangling incident, I was surprised to receive a letter from Oxfordshire FA. It seemed the player was appealing against his dismissal and had asked for a personal hearing. I was even more bemused when at the hearing in the back room of a pub in Henley-on-Thames, I discovered the basis of his appeal. It seemed that he had been sent off three times in the recent past and the unifying factor was that all three referees concerned came from Caversham. I lived in Caversham those days but I was fairly new to refereeing and didn't know any other referees living in that part of town. Even if I had, the suggestion that there was a conspiracy amongst referees living there to take action against him, was of course ludicrous. The specially
convened disciplinary committee agreed and threw out his appeal.

Since that early experience I have noted how serial offenders, to coin a phrase, are never the ones to blame for their behaviour. It is always the fault of the referees, who act against them on the basis of their reputation, which of course they claim is totally unjustified.

The latest high profile player to take this stance is Muzzy Izzet, the Turkish international midfielder of Leicester City. Izzet has the season's worst disciplinary record in the country, averaging a caution every other match, together with a sending off. "There is no way I am a dirty player," says Izzet, "and I think that referees are paying special attention to me". He does go on to say, "There may have been a few mistimed tackles but it's only because I am totally committed to the club and we are desperate to get results". Terry Venables recently defended bad boy Alan Smith in the same vein, "He cares and you can see he is Leeds through and through". This commitment to the cause may please managers but don't blame the referees if they don't share in the admiration and start to reach with regularity for their
pocket notebooks.

The club of the player I sent off, made a plea on his behalf to the committee. Despite the fact that he promised to wait for me after the game and extract his own retribution, (which he didn't do), they said away from the field he was the nicest and gentlest of people. Paranoid Arsene Wenger, made a similar claim to defend Denis Bergkamp. "He is too nice a person to hit out in anger". I think the
televised evidence of him stamping on Blackburn defender Nils-Eric Johansson and his dreadful lunge at Liverpool's Jamie Carragher last season tends to rule out more lenient treatment by referees based on that testimonial.

Oliver Kahn's reaction was that the whole matter was ridiculous. "I only put my hand around his neck. After all, football is man's game". Now that, as Samuel Johnson might have said, is the last refuge of the serial offender.

Dick Sawdon Smith

 

© R Sawdon Smith 2002

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