{"id":296682,"date":"2023-11-16T19:24:06","date_gmt":"2023-11-16T19:24:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sportslifetale.com\/?p=296682"},"modified":"2023-11-16T19:24:06","modified_gmt":"2023-11-16T19:24:06","slug":"ian-ladyman-pochettinos-rage-shows-why-football-has-abuse-problem","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sportslifetale.com\/soccer\/ian-ladyman-pochettinos-rage-shows-why-football-has-abuse-problem\/","title":{"rendered":"IAN LADYMAN: Pochettino's rage shows why football has abuse problem"},"content":{"rendered":"
It turns out that the best referee in world rugby is friends with Anthony Taylor. Among the many things the recently retired Wayne Barnes must feel for Taylor will surely be a sense of pity.<\/p>\n
Barnes \u2014 who recently refereed the World Cup final between South Africa and New Zealand at the Stade de France \u2014 was once criticised heavily on social media by Springboks director of rugby Rassie Erasmus. It is a famous incident because it\u2019s rare in the sport. Erasmus was banned for two games. Previously he had served 12 months for criticism of another official.<\/p>\n
Yet Taylor and his colleagues in football\u2019s Premier League run this gauntlet every week while the sport carries on regardless, to the extent that it\u2019s become normalised. So, yes, Barnes must pity his friend and then some.<\/p>\n
Taylor was the match referee when Chelsea held Manchester City to a breathtaking 4-4 draw at Stamford Bridge last Sunday. It was another marvellous afternoon of football yet the way Chelsea manager Mauricio Pochettino\u00a0behaved towards Taylor\u2019s fourth official Craig Pawson at full time stands as another staging post in our sport\u2019s rapid descent towards the gutter.<\/p>\n
He\u2019s a good man, Pochettino. Cares about people. Cares about sport. He apologised publicly within half an hour and not many do that. Fair play.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Mauricio Pochettino screamed in Craig Pawson’s face before marching across the pitch to have a go at Anthony Taylor during Chelsea’s 4-4 draw against Manchester City<\/p>\n
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Football’s lawmakers are planning to introduce sin-bins going forward to deal with dissent<\/p>\n
Your browser does not support iframes.<\/p>\n
He still did it, though. He still screamed in Pawson\u2019s face from a distance of about a foot and a half before striding across the turf to have a go at Taylor, too.<\/p>\n
Football\u2019s response has been to take into account the yellow card shown to Pochettino by Taylor and consider it case closed.<\/p>\n
And so the message here is that all this is OK. It\u2019s not ideal, for sure. But it\u2019s OK. It\u2019s a yellow card offence, the equivalent of what a player receives for a handball, a trip, a shirt pull or an obstruction in the centre circle.<\/p>\n
So is this OK? No, of course it\u2019s not and while Sunday\u2019s game was thundering towards its conclusion, the Northumberland Football League was preparing a letter to their member clubs warning them of the accelerating levels of abuse towards officials at junior matches.<\/p>\n
\u2018The behaviour and conduct of far too many players, managers, coaches and spectators is the worst we have ever seen,\u2019 said the league\u2019s secretary Lee Scott.<\/p>\n
\u2018If you cannot watch a group of children playing football without feeling the need to abuse or shout at a child \u2014 whether they be a player or a referee \u2014 then please ask yourself if you have chosen the correct way to spend your weekends.\u2019<\/p>\n
It\u2019s the kind of missive that should bring us up short. Adults screaming at teenage referees. It\u2019s startling when viewed in black and white print.<\/p>\n
But the reality is that this is what football has become in this country, at all levels. This is the main reason why referees are dropping out of the game in record numbers. This is why at grassroots level there are no longer enough of them.\u00a0<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Pochettino apologised for his actions but football\u2019s response to incidents this has been to take into account the yellow card shown by Taylor and consider it as case closed<\/p>\n
This is the culture that professional football has helped to create. This is the effect of the drip, and the slowness with which the game at the highest level is attempting to tackle it is scandalous.<\/p>\n
Football does meddling very well. Meddle with the handball law. Meddle with the offside law. Talk about taking throw-ins with your feet (Copyright: Mr A. Wenger). But the serious stuff? The stuff that really matters and which actually impacts on the health and future of our game? It\u2019s safe to say football likes to drag its feet on all that.<\/p>\n
This week it emerged that football\u2019s law-makers \u2014 the International Football Association Board \u2014 are to consider trials for sin-bins for dissent. It\u2019s an excellent idea. Abuse the referee and you\u2019re off the field for 10 minutes or so. IFAB\u2019s next meeting later this month will also discuss adopting rugby\u2019s policy of allowing only a team captain to approach a match official. That sounds like a good idea, too.<\/p>\n
But all this stuff is so obvious it\u2019s terrifying. This is not cutting-edge science we are talking about. It\u2019s merely good practice already being used well in other sports.<\/p>\n
It turns out that trials of sin-bins have been taking place for four years in English grassroots football. Four years! That\u2019s a heck of a trial. The next step, we are told, is to roll out such an experiment in some of the lower professional leagues.<\/p>\n
Why so slow? Why so careful? Why not fast-track the procedure when it\u2019s clear this is a problem that is strangling football and participation levels all across the world?<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
IFAB\u2019s next meeting will also discuss adopting rugby\u2019s policy of allowing only a team captain to approach a match official<\/p>\n
When I was first asked to write a column on these pages in 2019, the first one I offered was about dissent. I reported back then that no player had received a straight red card for foul and abusive language in the English Premier League for seven years. That now stands at 11 years.<\/p>\n
There have been 88 yellow cards for dissent in the Premier League this season but all that shows is that the system isn\u2019t working. Yellow cards mean nothing to players and managers. Red ones do. Sin-bins would.<\/p>\n
Barnes\u2019s life as a rugby referee has been far from easy and straightforward. Online abuse towards him and his family has been consistent. But at least he knew he was walking into a relatively safe place every time he stepped on to the field.<\/p>\n
In an interview with the Times this week he joked that he was soon due to referee a football game in which his son was playing. \u2018I will probably get more s*** from the sidelines than I did at the Stade de France,\u2019 Barnes laughed.<\/p>\n
Funny? It would be if it weren\u2019t so desperately and dismally true.<\/p>\n
Ramsdale’s father hasn’t helped<\/span><\/p>\n When I was a young football writer in Nottingham, the Notts County manager, the late Colin Murphy, pulled me up one day, after I had written a story about his unsettled centre forward.<\/p>\n \u2018Have you helped us, Ian?\u2019 Murphy asked as I floundered for a sense of justification I knew I had buried somewhere in the back of my brain.<\/p>\n \u2018Have you helped us?\u2019 he continued.<\/p>\n I thought about this when listened to Aaron Ramsdale\u2019s father, Nick, complain on an Arsenal fans\u2019 podcast about the treatment of his son by manager Mikel Arteta.<\/p>\n Has any of this helped him, Nick?<\/p>\n Of course it hasn\u2019t.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Aaron Ramsdale’s father has leapt to his defence after being dropped from Arsenal’s line-up<\/p>\n Why I hold firm in my Celtic opinion\u00a0<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n Much feedback on last week\u2019s suggestion that Brendan Rodgers had erred by going back to Celtic. I am still blushing from the tone of some of it.<\/p>\n But there is no point in having a view if you don\u2019t stand by it and the weekend\u2019s results rather played into my hands.<\/p>\n Fresh from a 6-0 defeat at Atletico Madrid in the Champions League, Celtic returned to SPL action and beat Aberdeen by the same score.<\/p>\n Rodgers\u2019 team are top of the league with 35 points now.<\/p>\n St Mirren in third have 19, albeit having played a game less.<\/p>\n And there we have it. Not good enough for Europe\u2019s big competition but far too good for their own.<\/p>\n Remind me again what Rodgers can achieve in Scotland that he didn\u2019t last time round\u2026<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Celtic continue to impress domestically but suffer in Europe – much like Brendan Rodgers’ first spell at the club<\/p>\n Sancho has himself to blame\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n If Jadon Sancho leaves Manchester United for Serie A, he will likely do well.<\/p>\n Chris Smalling, Ashley Young and Fikayo Tomori all flourished in Italy.<\/p>\n Let\u2019s not dress this up, though. Sancho had his chance at one of the biggest clubs and, for various reasons, did not take it. One day, when the anger subsides, he\u2019ll wake up and realise that this one is on him.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Jadon Sancho would do well in Italy but he hasn’t taken his chance at Manchester United\u00a0<\/p>\n It’s All Kicking Off\u00a0is an exciting new podcast from Mail Sport that promises a different take on Premier League football, launching with a preview show today and every week this season.<\/span><\/p>\n It is available on MailOnline, Mail+, YouTube , Apple Music and Spotify<\/span><\/p>\n Your browser does not support iframes.<\/p>\nIT’S ALL KICKING OFF!\u00a0<\/h3>\n