*Official* English Football Season 2009-2010

[Nate]

Give Shawcross se7en!

 

[sledger]

Personally, I don't want it any other way. Football is dangerous, all sports are dangerous, people get hurt occasionally. I like physical football. It's more fun to watch and more fun to play.

Bowling a bouncer is dangerous too, and until such bowling is met with more punitive measures more regularly, a fast bowler's instinct will remain to aim for the batsman's head or get 'im meloned or however you want to put it.

Look, if you prefer football to be played the Spanish way that's entirely up to you, just like some would prefer cricket to be played the gentleman's way. But there's not really a moral high ground for you to sit upon unless you're equally condemning of Jimmy Anderson knocking out two of Daniel Flynn's teeth.

Playing hard and playing recklessly/dangerously are two different things for mine

 

[duffer]

Would compare a lot of the tackles we get to Brett Lee fast beamers as opposed to bouncers.

 

[Uppercut]

Playing hard and playing recklessly/dangerously are two different things for mine

It's a blurry line tstl.

Look, I'm on the fence as to whether Shawcross should have been sent off for that challenge. But it's impossible to stop challenges like that without fundamentally altering the entire game.

 

[Uppercut]

Would compare a lot of the tackles we get to Brett Lee fast beamers as opposed to bouncers.

Who's been injured by a beamer though? It's the bouncers that have caused the vast majority of serious cricketing injuries.

 

[BoyBrumby]

Personally, I don't want it any other way. Football is dangerous, all sports are dangerous, people get hurt occasionally. I like physical football. It's more fun to watch and more fun to play.

Bowling a bouncer is dangerous too, and until such bowling is met with more punitive measures more regularly, a fast bowler's instinct will remain to aim for the batsman's head or get 'im meloned or however you want to put it.

Look, if you prefer football to be played the Spanish way that's entirely up to you, just like some would prefer cricket to be played the gentleman's way. But there's not really a moral high ground for you to sit upon unless you're equally condemning of Jimmy Anderson knocking out two of Daniel Flynn's teeth.

It's a false opposition tho; Anderson isn't commiting a foul by bowling short, especially not to a top order batsman, however nominal that assignation is WRT Flynn.

If he bowled a dozen consecutive bouncers to Chris Martin and ended up rearranging his denition, then yes, I would prefer action to be taken.

 

[sledger]

Well, imo, Shawcross could have gone in hard and safely if he had wanted to. Yeah sure, it happened quickly, but that doesn't make it any better or more reasonable in my eyes. As a player myself, I enjoy a hard tackle, and wouldn't want to see them wiped out, but there is a point where you can't just throw yourself in for the sake of it, this was not a last ditch desperate attempt at a clearance to protect his goal, it was in my eyes a mindless hack at the ball midway up the pitch from which in all probability he would have gained nothing.

 

[dontcloseyoureyes]

Don't think anyone is actually defending Van Persie here tbh

Everyone conveniently ignored it at the time, however, because it didn't break a leg.

 

[sledger]

Everyone conveniently ignored it at the time, however, because it didn't break a leg.

Hey I'm not denying that. Given what followed it was probably inevitable that no attention got paid to it. I'm not suggesting that makes it any better.

 

[Uppercut]

It's a false opposition tho; Anderson isn't commiting a foul by bowling short, especially not to a top order batsman, however nominal that assignation is WRT Flynn.

If he bowled a dozen consecutive bouncers to Chris Martin and ended up rearranging his denition, then yes, I would prefer action to be taken.

Well, should it be a foul? Going over the top of the ball in football is classed as a foul because it's dangerous. Bowling a bouncer is dangerous too. So why is it allowed?

Really, because the game would be so much poorer if it wasn't. You could cut out the occasional serious injuries, but everyone else would have less fun and that's considered a fair enough trade-off. IMO, if you were to toughen up footballing laws in the way that you suggest, it would seriously weaken the game as an activity and as a spectacle. You'd have a few less serious injuries (although as you yourself pointed out earlier, such injuries are extremely rare) but football would be much more boring. Isn't that just how you feel about the idea of outlawing bouncers in cricket?

 

[BoyBrumby]

Everyone conveniently ignored it at the time, however, because it didn't break a leg.

Yep, fair point. Goes back to what I was advocating about video replays tho.

 

[sledger]

Well, should it be a foul? Going over the top of the ball in football is classed as a foul because it's dangerous. Bowling a bouncer is dangerous too. So why is it allowed?

You actually stand to gain something other than crippling someone by bowling a bouncer itbt. By nature of going over the ball you are very unlikely to do anything other than cause injury, let alone have a minimal chance of winning the ball.

 

[BoyBrumby]

Well, should it be a foul? Going over the top of the ball in football is classed as a foul because it's dangerous. Bowling a bouncer is dangerous too. So why is it allowed?

Really, because the game would be so much poorer if it wasn't. You could cut out the occasional serious injuries, but everyone else would have less fun and that's considered a fair enough trade-off. IMO, if you were to toughen up footballing laws in the way that you suggest, it would seriously weaken the game as an activity and as a spectacle. You'd have a few less serious injuries (although as you yourself pointed out earlier, such injuries are extremely rare) but football would be much more boring. Isn't that just how you feel about the idea of outlawing bouncers in cricket?

Bouncers are potentially dangerous, yes, but then so is aiming a hardened leather ball at someone's shins if it comes to that. Reductio ad absurdum therefore means cricket itself should be outlawed.

Sometimes injuries happen from the most innocuous tackles, so the only way to eradicate the possibility of inhuries from challenges would be to make football non-contact which no-one wants. However Shawcross's wasn't innocuous; it was reckless at best and should have no place in the modern game.

 

[dontcloseyoureyes]

Hey I'm not denying that. Given what followed it was probably inevitable that no attention got paid to it. I'm not suggesting that makes it any better.

Except that what followed would almost certainly not have followed if it wasn't for the "tackle"...

 

[chalky]

Anyone watching the pub football on Sky Sports 1 would have just seen almoast an identical tackle (to the Shawcross one) by the Rangers centre half against the Celtic forward. Only a free kick was given.

 

[sledger]

Except that what followed would almost certainly not have followed if it wasn't for the "tackle"...

Well, maybe, who knows? Bottom line is what happened did happen I guess. Again, not that this makes the "tackle" any more excusable, but it offers some insight as to why it was overlooked.

 

[sledger]

Anyone watching the pub football on Sky Sports 1 would have just seen almoast an identical tackle (to the Shawcross one) by the Rangers centre half against the Celtic forward. Only a free kick was given.

Broken leg was it? No. oh.

 

[Loony BoB]

Again, I don't think it was reckless - I think it was an error of judgement. It looked to me like he genuinely thought he was going to win the ball, and as said (a cliché, but still true), "it happened so fast". There are far, far, far more reckless challenges/tackles that happen day-in, day-out in the PL. Also, again, as I've mentioned - if things were minutely different - and it would only take a splitsecond of difference - Ramsey could well have ended up with his foot going through Shawcross's leg. It was completely 50/50. If you want to take out recklessness, and you consider Shawcross's challenge as reckless, then I would dare say that Ramsey's challenge - despite the fact that he won it - was also reckless. Card the guy with the broken leg? "But he won it!" - again, as said before (and nobody has replied to that post of mine...) - so do others, but they can still injure the other player regardless as in the case of Possebon's injury.

 

[sledger]

Define reckless plz.

 

[PhoenixFire]

Isn't a pedant.