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THE WEEK ON THE TEES 28-2-08
Luke Raine
This week has seen one big football story which is extremely hard to ignore.
Saturday saw the horrific injury sustained by Arsenal’s Eduardo da Silva courtesy of what can only be described as a horrific challenge from Birmingham’s Martin Taylor.
However, I am not for one moment suggesting that Taylor deliberately went out to break Eduardo’s leg. In fact, I actually have sympathy for the Blues' defender. It is the F.A who have left me incensed.
Saturday also saw the decision by Lee Mason at Anfield to send off Jeremie Aliadiere for what can only be described as the slightest of slaps on the cheek of Liverpool midfielder Javier Mascherano.
At that stage of the game, common sense should surely have prevailed and Mason could have quite easily taken the two players aside and spoken to them about the incident. Perhaps he could have even given Aliadiere a yellow card.
The decision to show him a red card (which was the same punishment received by Taylor four hours earlier for nearly ending a player’s career) was almost laughable.
I am not saying that Boro would have got a point at the weekend if he hadn't been dismissed but we could have done without the player receiving a three game ban at this stage of the season.
However the FA weren’t quite finished there and I wasn’t even incensed yet.
On Monday, Boro took the decision to appeal and on Tuesday, it was announced that the club had failed. Surely the FA could have ended it there, even though a sense of injustice could still be felt.
There was more to come however and Aliadiere received an extra game on his ban for a so-called “frivolous appeal”.
So now an action which probably didn’t even tickle Mascherano is getting a sterner punishment than a tackle which left a man with two broken bones, resulting in the paramedics having the task of saving his foot on the pitch for a number of minutes.
These two incidents and their respective punishments don’t add up and something has surely got to be done about it.
The term "frivolous appeal" also undermines what the FA say in public.
On the outside it is all about clubs having a good relationship with the sport's National Governing Body but when a small side like ours has the audacity to question the decision of one of its officials, they make an example out of them.
Some may say that I am looking too deeply into this individual incident because I am a follower of Middlesbrough Football Club. Others may say that if it was a different team then I wouldn’t be looking into the issue so deeply. In fact I think it is a sad indication into the way English football is going in the present era.
Back to the Martin Taylor tackle and specifically the reaction of Arsenal manager Arsene Wenger.
Wenger has been given a lot of bad press regarding his reaction to the tackle in the post match press conference, even though he did retract his "ban Taylor for life" statement a number of hours later.
This led me to wonder whether reactions from managers are influenced by whether or not they played the game themselves.
In the last decade, the two best examples of this are Wenger and Jose Mourinho as neither played the game at a high level. Does this affect the way they see an incident during the game?
At Boro, two of the last three managers have had fairly distinguished playing careers. This means, in my opinion, that they are in a better position to judge the big issues within the game.
In fact there are very few managers in the present era who have not had successful playing careers.
I would never argue with the records of Wenger or Mourinho in English football but the two of them have probably had more bad press than any other manager during the Premier League years.
Looking more closely at the week just gone at The Riverside and the news that Stewart Downing has put pen to paper on his new deal has been warmly greeted.
As I said last week, Downing is a player who we should be very happy to have tied down for the next five years. His comments that he “wanted to win trophies” with the club are also very encouraging too.
Last night saw the team progress to the quarter finals of the FA Cup, albeit with the aid of a cruel own goal from Sheffield United goalkeeper Paddy Kenny.
Not many could argue that Boro were the side that deserved to progress after the two hours though, and whilst the game may not have been too pleasing on the eye, the team still did a professional job to set up a home tie with Cardiff City.
The performance of record signing Afonso Alves was also very encouraging. The striker looked very sharp during his seventy or so minutes on the pitch and this bodes well for the remainder of the season.
I have said previously in this column that I don’t expect to see the best of Alves until next season but on the back of his performance last night I may be forced to re-evaluate.
Luke Raine
RETURN TO THE WEEK ON THE TEES INDEX HERE
A GUARANTEED PROFIT OF AT LEAST £41.20 ON PORTSMOUTH v FULHAM
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Please note that the bonuses are valid for new customers only so if you already have an account with one or more of the bookies we are using, you won't be able to do this. If that is the case, mail us or phone us on 01642 223229 and we'll create an alternative bet for you using different bookies.
This method of betting was used very successfully during the 2006 World Cup and you can read all about how it was done right here.
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