The Guilty Men

http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/35495835

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Hope club and fans rebell against this, utterly shameful!

 

I would be amazed if the FA did anything other than give both clubs the same fine. Don't think we (as a club) have been charged with anything for a long time, so hopefully the fine will be fairly small.

 

Who controls the quality of the referee and his linesmen....this game deteriorated because of poor refereeing and clamping down on time wasting.

Question marks against the goal and the deliberate blocking off of McCormick.

 

I just read this on the beeb and thought it was April already. It has to be a joke to charge both clubs because I was there and Argyle did nothing. The only person who should have seen Red was Hayes who charged in from a great distance and started shoving McHugh. McHugh didn't even retaliate yet got booked. Watch the replay. The other one at the end is Ainsworth being a dick. The Ref failed to referee in a responsible manner all game which led to people getting frustrated and if the lino says he saw something untoward with the scuffle then he is a liar because there wasn't anything. He got McHugh booked for nothing and in my book cheated to get his own back for the crowd giving him justified stick.

You are right though lyndhurst. The FA won't really look into anything and will do both clubs equally because they have no interest in League 2 and will bottle any justice.

 

Unless they get a bung!!

 

Just read an article in the Herald about a fan writing to the FA about the Referee. Quite restrained email from my perspective but makes it clear how poor the Ref was. Apparently the FA are mandated to respond so he should get a reply. I will bet now that they ignore his comments and as has been said both clubs will be found guilty with the real guilty people getting off. Real guilty people being all 3 of the officials. You have to ask what the Assessor was doing all afternoon if the Ref has a league one match to cock up this week. His report should have been scathing if he had any honesty and the Ref should be up in front of the FA Beak not the clubs. Certainly not Argyle anyway.

 

We should all write similarly. The FA won't publicly take it into account in our case but privately Gibbs' card may be marked. He had no control over the game so no wonder it went wrong.

I think the inevitable fine may need the order of £5K but the figure will be less if we admit the charge. I certainly think we should fight it as a matter of principle. Wycombe provoked both of the fracas and the ref was ineffective.

 

At Port Vale today and the stats show he booked one player quite late on. There was a 3 minute injury in the first half which included a substitution plus one goal. 6 minutes were added. In the second half there were 5 subs and a goal for which another 5 minutes were added. The one booking was for Coventry who committed 15 fouls. Looks like his watch has been repaired then.

 

I am totally hacked off having just read on the beeb site that the Jury has returned and the outcome of the disciplinary hearing. Firstly I read that both clubs pleaded guilty to the charges. I still fail to see what Adams did at the final whistle to plead guilty to. This is even worse though. We were fined £3000 and Wycombe only £2500. Why is that then? Argyle were less guilty than them on the day not more and Ainswroth seems to have escaped altogether from being a complete and utter cock. The Referee gets nothing at all and he was the bigest offender of them all. I had the opinion that the FA were totally clueless before now. My estimation has gone much further down and I can't think of a suitable expletive which covers them now. I would also say that I'm disappointed with Argyle doing the guilty plea. I would guess that the fanbase is not going to agree with any of this.

 

Plead not guilty and you have no chance of arguing against a ref, totally useless as he may be, and the fine is doubled anyway.

 

We got fined more than Wycombe according to BBC....utter disgrace!

 

I just read a few comments by a couple of Managers on the beeb about things that went on in last night's matches. I then came back on here to have a look at what was said when we played these sides. Funny really but our comments have a lot in common with those I'd just read.

Northampton did nothing but whinge and whinge at the Ref down here and got decisions left and right. Last night they got a dodgy decision that lead to their penalty and a few others thrown in. Accrington did a fair bit of whinging at the Ref also and Carlisle's manager was hacked off by them surrounding the Ref and getting his player sent off after 34 seconds. As expected once the object was achieved the player whose leg had been hacked off in three places got up and was fine after his hair was re-set. We had Wycombe problems and I have read twice since that teams and supporters of their opposition have had a go at their tactics and antics. Clearly it's how they are "advised" to play by their own management who think it's ok to do it regularly.

When you consider that all 3 of the above are up there either in automatic or playoff places then you might wonder if they truely deserve to be there. It would be fair to say that 2 of the 3 are probably playing above their weight of expectation. Maybe this is the only way they can be where they are so justify it that way. I think that it is creepinng into this league a little too often and more and more seem to be adopting the same tactics which is a crying shame if true. As if football in this league wasn't hard or bad enough already without this being normal. It's going to kill football at this level if it continues.

 

Only needs the refs to book one or two and the problem will reduce.

I watched the Arsenal v Leicester game on Sunday. Play was rightly stopped just after half time for a foul by Leicester's Simpson on Sanchez. Sanchez writhed around a bit but then blatantly raised his hand in the "book him ref" gesture. Simpson was booked and was later sent off, but why wasn't Sanchez booked for ungentlemanly conduct? The ref was Martin Atkinson, on of the two English refs going to the Euros. If a ref at that top level doesn't stamp on the cheating and the whingeing, who will? Or is even he afraid of the likes of Arsenal and 60,000 fans?

 

We have not got any decent refs in this country.. Surely its now down to the FA and FL to clamp down on this whinging, players wanting others booked.. I thought surrounding the ref was an offence? The fans are paying good money to watch football at all level's and as Sensible has stated its ruining the game.. At least we try and play and get on with it.. we deserve to be in the top 3..

 

I do think taking your time here and there if you are in front or getting a point you think is reasonable in return is ok up to a point. Every single side in the World would do that. It's taking it to an art form and extreme that gets me. I also thought they were going to stamp out the Ref baiting thing as well. Did anyone else notice Mansfield's No. 6 on Saturday screaming out loud everytime a tackle was made? Not just on him either but any tackle in his half. I agree, the Ref should book these players and keep doing it until they pack it in. When I played if I had gone to the Ref and cried foul expecting a card to be brandished (not that they had cards then) I would have been laughed off the pitch. I wonder how kean a Manager would be for his players to "contest" a decision if 5 or 6 of them got yellow cards all at once after 5 minutes. What would be his chances of having 11 players on the pitch at full time if that happened? I bet they wouldn't do it in the next game for sure. But it's like diving isn't it. They were going to do this and that to stop it and now even Managers encourage their players to go down and the pundits think it's legit and say so out loud. Referees do nothing except in blatant cases and even then sometimes do nothing to them.

 

Players at every club will do it from time to time. With Wycombe though it was so clearly planned & orchestrated. A couple of examples which they deployed several times:

• We all know even as fans that for free kicks and throw-ins, the lino stands so that the ball should go into play along a line across the pitch. How many times did Wycombe first try it in front of that line and ask the ref if they were OK, then go too far back so they had to be moved forward? Then, as a variation on a theme, how many times did they then decide the keeper should take the kick rather than an outfield player?
• While one of their players was down receiving life saving surgery for gunshot wounds did they methodically work the ball as far as possible away from the site of the free kick they'd cheated themselves into? When the maimed player was eventually resuscitated, a long slow process of retrieving the ball began so eventually it could be inserted into Process 1 above.

All of this has to be systematic, deliberate and planned - that's what makes it so corrosive to the spirit of the game.

 

Trouble is notdistant, they did it, got away with it as did the Ref and linos, we got fined and lost the match and nothing but nothing will change any of it. These teams who practice the art of injury don't accept there is anything wrong with it when they steel points and their supporters just love the 3 points when it's away. We all know that if it isn't stamped on then it will grow until it becomes the norm just like the diving thing. One thing I do like with Rugby is that when there is a head injury the player has to go off to be medically assessed before continuing. That can take 5 to 10 minutes. If they are worried about head injuries then there is your answer. I would bet there would be a lot less of them.

 

When a Rugby player goes off for assessment regarding a head injury.....a player comes on to take his place....and that player will go off if the original player comes back.......at the moment in football if a player goes off he doesn't come back for any reason .....so in Rugby they are never one player short.

 

And there on the beeb is the story that just compounds the injustice of a lot of this. The 34 second sending off has been overturned on appeal. So the consequences of them surrounding the Ref and getting the red Card in the first place helped them in the match but has no consequences for them now to reverse it. No punishment for Accrington. No punishment for the Ref for being weak and pursuaded and getting it wrong. Isn't justice wonderful in football.

As for being one player short well sod it so what. Stop cheating and they can reverse the need for the player to leave. It's down to them.