Birmingham's unbeaten start to this year's Premiership programme and their
proud boast that they hadn't conceded a goal away from home, came to a
staggering halt at Old Trafford last Saturday where they were beaten by
Manchester United.
The three-nil scoreline was probably contributed to by the
fact that for almost an hour they had to play with ten men, after their goalkeeper
Mark Taylor had been sent off. His offence was to bring down Paul Scholes as
he made his way past him to what would have been an open goal.
On the television that evening and in the Sunday newspapers no one denied that it was
a penalty, it was the sending off that was called controversial.
Steve Bruce, the Birmingham Manager, is reported to have said that he didn't
blame the referee. 'He had no choice under the present rules. If he hadn't done it
the assessor in the stand would have deducted marks. I'm just saying that it
ruined a good game of football. If referees were allowed to show common sense
in a situation like this, I think the whole crowd would be pleased. After all they
pay to see a contest between twenty-two players'.
This point of view had a great deal of sympathy from television pundits and newspaper reporters, although not
all were quite so generous to the referee. One reporter laid the blame at the
referee's feet for 'interpreting the goalkeeper's action as a professional foul'.
There is of course so such thing as a professional foul in the Laws of the
Game but in this context it is worth recalling how this relatively new addition to
the laws came about. We got by for over a hundred years without it. It was only
incorporated in the laws in 1995 although it had been an International FA Board
interpretation for a couple of years before. It was professional
players or, more properly, their coaches and managers who forced the introduction of this new
clause.
Players were encouraged to bring down by fair means or foul, any opponent who was getting clear and seemed likely to score. Players who didn't
do it put themselves in line to receive a roasting from the manager. 'So you give
away a penalty, he would have scored anyway and penalties have been missed
or saved, we're no worse off and could be better'.
That's how the theory went and why it was called the 'professional foul'. Steve Bruce says that supporters would prefer to see twenty-two players
contest the match, but what they would also like to see is more goal scoring
opportunities and not goals being prevented by illegal spoiling tactics. They
want to see a contest of skill not of cloggers.
But, the detractors said over the weekend, this was not a case of a player on the way to goal being deliberately
clogged down. It was a genuine and honest attempt to reach the ball by the
Birmingham goalkeeper and Scholes was only brought down because the
goalkeeper got there fractionally late.
The law makes no reference to whether the foul is deliberate or an honest tackle gone wrong. What it says is 'A player
shall be sent off if he denies an obvious goalscoring opportunity to an opponent
moving towards the player's goal, by an offence punishable by a free kick or a
penalty kick'.
On one hand we have people like Steve Bruce bemoaning that referees can't use their common sense anymore' and on the other, managers,
supporters, and journalists demanding that referees be more consistent with their
decisions. In this way referees are consistent. If we say they have a choice based
on their common sense interpretation of the goalkeeper's motives, then we are
going to have inconsistency by the very nature of it.
At least this way goalkeepers know the risk they take for trying to keep a clean sheet with rash
tackles.
Dick Sawdon Smith