Lionel Messi has been banned for four international games for "directing insulting words at an assistant referee." Bit harsh.
Really? Standard practice to ban players for swearing at a ref, and generally the insults stack, so two insults is double the ban, etc.
Really? I can't find a single other example of a player getting an international four match ban for swearing at an official. I can't find a single example of a player in England getting a four match ban for swearing at an official either. Gerard Pique once got one for swearing at an official in a Spanish league game, but that's it, it's obviously exceptionally rare.
Three Tigers were in line to feature for their national sides on Tuesday night, but in the end only Ahmed Elmohamady made an appearance as the international break drew to a close. Elmohamady played the full 90 minutes as Egypt beat Togo 3-0 in a friendly, with goals coming from Kahraba, Ahmed El Sheikh and Mohamed Elneny. David Meyler was an unused substitute for the Republic of Ireland as they lost their friendly against Iceland 1-0 in Dublin, and it was the same for Abel Hernandez who watched from the bench as Uruguay surrendered a lead for the second time in five days in a 2-1 defeat against Peru. http://www.hullcitytigers.com/news/...s-to-a-close-3647484.aspx#QjCHyVQlXwxEZADO.99
My teammate was banned for the season for swearing at officials. There is no tolerance for it. How many cases have you found of players swearing at refs and getting away with it? The bans are rare because players don't do it, because they know the consequences.
There's loads of cases of players getting a yellow for swearing at the ref, barely any reds, despite the fact you see players swearing at the ref pretty much every game. Messi's four match ban is quite obviously exceptional, as there aren't any other examples. Graham Poll - Lionel Messi's four-game ban for swearing is very harsh and maybe against the laws of the game... http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/fo...ame-ban-maybe-against-laws.html#ixzz4chzRhjyU
If my computer wasn't having issues I'd load up the rules to quote, but if you accuse the ref of cheating, swear at him, threaten him, etc. it's MEANT to result in a suspension, with each separate comment stacking. Has happened a few times in my local comp, and it was drilled into us when being trained. If professional refs tend to overlook it in the heat of the moment, then that's a bit different but at a guess I would say that there is a distinction between something like "You can't be ****ing serious" and "**** you you dirty ****". From my understanding what Messi said was along the lines of the latter.
Swearing at a ref is a straight red card. Again. There's a distinction between swearing at a ref and swearing in general.
Simply not true hey? As I suspected, most refs don't deal with it because they don't think it's worth it. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/football...-are-turning-a-blind-eye-to-abusive-language/
Jesus ****ing wept. The rules say you can get a straight red for swearing at an official. In reality it doesn't happen, since the rules came in here ahead of this season, not one player has been sent off or banned for swearing. So your 'standard practise' comments was bollocks. You're doing that arguing a stupid point thing again.
FFS you said that it's simply not true that that's the rule. It is the ****ing rule. The article you posted saying it was against the laws of the game is laughable. I actually gave players too much benefit of the doubt in assuming most didn't do it, but it seems refs get more tolerant the further up the chain. Hugely disappointing. I said that when it is reported players are suspended as standard practice at all levels of the game, but I suspect refs don't see much point in going through the hassle. As a quick search proved. Law 12 of the Laws of the Game is incredibly clear, I don't know how much more 'standard practice' you can get than being in black and white in the rules.
I think my mistake was to say it was standard practice at all levels of the game, I was speaking with my ref's hat on and what I do in that situation. So I was wrong to apply that and assume it was a standard practice at the professional level of the game. As I can't think of many example where I've seen a player swear AT a ref - as in, insulting the ref - I just assumed it was a rare occurrence in the PL. The fact remains the law is the law. As an aside, not every discussion/debate about things on here needs to descend to swearing and snide comments, I was quite happy to discuss this rationally.
BARCELONA, Spain (AP) — Barcelona says Lionel Messi's four-match international suspension for insulting a linesman was "unfair and totally disproportionate." Barcelona released a statement Wednesday expressing "its surprise and indignation" with FIFA's decision to sideline the playmaker for so long following the incident in Argentina's win over Chile in World Cup qualifying last week. The punishment was announced before Argentina lost at Bolivia 2-0 Tuesday, a result that left the two-time champions at risk of not qualifying for next year's World Cup in Russia. Barcelona says it "wishes to reiterate its support for Leo Messi, an exemplary player in terms of conduct both on and off the field." Pending an appeal, Messi will only be available to play in Argentina's final qualifier, on Oct. 10 against Ecuador. https://apnews.com/b33ecc4e86cc4fd2b2d054625fde1e32/Barcelona-defends-Messi-over-'unfair'-suspension
Didn't Deano once get a 6 match ban when playing for Aberdeen? Pretty sure part of that was for abusing the ref but agree, any sort of sending off or ban is relatively unprecedented
Is that when Deano got sent off then confronted the ref after the game in the car park ? I'm not even sure what you could say to a linesman to get a 4 match ban