Those of you, who discovered the column on Monday last week in the re-vamped football coverage in the
Evening Post, will know what I feel about football
manager’s continual bitching about referees. However, one aspect of manager’s behaviour which I think is even worse is when managers refuse to condemn bad tackling by their players.
What do I mean by bad tackles? An excellent example happened just before Christmas at the Everton v Chelsea game. I have to admit that I didn’t see the tackle, either in person or on television, but the newspaper photographs give a very clear indication of what happened. They showed England and Chelsea captain John Terry coming in from distance, lunging with both feet off the ground and right leg stretched out studs first.
Apparently he caught Everton’s, Leon Osmond, half way up his leg. Chelsea manager Luiz Felipe Scolari criticised referee Phil Dowd for sending Terry off. Scolari has admitted in the past to using any tactic to win matches, including manipulating the ball boys but is he actually happy for his players to carry out career threatening tackles?
That’s really what it comes down to: by saying the referee was wrong it means he is condoning such behaviour. If he considers that a tackle off the ground, from a distance at speed, catching an opponent half way up the leg with studs showing and putting the opponent on crutches, is not a sending-off offence, you have to wonder what he thinks a player has to do to get a red card.
Of course he is not the only manager who cannot accept that such behaviour by his players should be condemned not condoned. In the Southampton – Manchester United FA Cup tie, the television replay showed quite clearly Matt Paterson jumping in at his opponent, high above the ball with his studs half way up the opponents shin. Southampton manager, Jan Poortviliet, in criticising the referee’s decision to dismiss Paterson, called it a ‘normal’ tackle.
Last week when talking about the Respect campaign I called it ‘respect for referees’ but in fact it is more than that. It also stands for respect for the game and respect for opponents. Referees are told that their first responsibility is for the safety of players to whom they have a duty of care. Is it too much to suggest that players also have a duty of care to their opponents?
Thankfully not all managers take the same views. Gareth Southgate, the Middlesbrough manager, when one of his players committed a similar tackle, took the player to apologise to his opponent and he said he couldn’t accept such tackles. Sir Alex Ferguson has been lobbying the FA this year to impose harsher bans for career threatening tackles. A good sign but I have to ask, where was Sir Alex when Roy Keane put Alf-Inge Haaland out of the game for ever, with a deliberate high tackle? I don’t remember him demanding stricter penalties then. Indeed in autobiography,
Managing my Life, he said of Keane, ‘I don’t think I could have a higher opinion of any footballer.’
What managers should be impressing on their players, is what Keith Hackett, head of referees in the professional game has told his referees. ‘A player who jumps into a challenge two-footed and is airborne, is not in control of himself or his challenge. This is also the case where, during the act of launching himself, he retracts one foot. If he makes contact with the player and misses the ball, he will be dismissed. If he makes contact with the player and the ball, he will still be dismissed.’
‘Every player,’ Hackett says, ‘must challenge with the safety of his opponent in mind and operate with a duty of care and responsibility to the game.
That’s what we want to hear from managers.
Dick Sawdon Smith
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© R Sawdon Smith 2009