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French footballer – offensive and unprofessional
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From a photographic perspective, I’m surprised that none of the photographers managed to get a shot of the handball.
I love football. I’ve watched football for over 40 years.
But this episode got me to thinking. Why is it acceptable to cheat at football, and not at other sports?Golfers regularly call a foul stroke on themselves. It doesn’t matter if there’s a million in prize money up for grabs, they still declare a penalty themselves.
Snooker is the same.
Although I know little about them, tennis & cricket appear to have a similar attitude
So why is it accepted in soccer, while someone who would try the same cheating in other sports would be shunned by their opponents?The answer, I think may lie in the origins of the sport in question.
This may appear to be “class discrimination” I know, but it seems to be the most logical explanation.Whereas soccer has it’s origins in “lower class” or “working class” , the opposite would be true of the other sports.
Golf & snooker (billiards) and tennis and cricket also, would have been played by the middle to upper classes. It would have been abhorrent to try and cheat at these games, and to get the name of being a cheat would bring shame. These are the people who believed in “Death before Dishonour”.
I think this attitude of anyone who cheats “destroying the integrity of the game”, has carried on to this day, despite the change from amateur to professional status.I have no axe to grind, by the way. I’m from a working class background myself. But , if you think about it, it does seem to make sense.
Heard on the radio this afternoon that in fact the French manager was having no
talk of a replay. The FFF and FIFA plus the team themselves were moving towards
a replay, however Domenech has somehow had the final say on the matter.Of course, if they didn’t qualify he’d have to give back his €700k bonus and
probably loose his job.Then again, they might just be using him as the excuse… who knows….
Rog, to me it’s a simple matter of honesty and integrity – and these are principles that are evident in all classes of society – snooker is hardly a middle/upper class sport.
If The Cheat had admitted to the ref there and then, he would now be a hero of honesty and sportsmanship.
Roy Keane has added his 10 cents of stupidity to the debate.
I find it so ironic/hypocritical that he’s telling the Irish team to “get over it” and he’s focusing on the poor defending instead. He’s also having pops at the FAI and believes what goes around comes around and he’s maybe hinting that this is payback for his treatment in Saipan. Sounds to me me Roy that your not over it! After watching the press interview a couple of times, you look like a man under a lot of pressure, maybe due to your teams poor results this year (1 win in 15 games). With regard to Saipan and John Delaney not contacting you, why would he contact a man who walked away from his country and the millions back in Ireland that didn’t want him to……including me. I do think however that the team’s spirit in Saipan benefited from his absence.
I haven’t missed a competitive home international in over twenty years and love travelling from Galway to Dublin to support my country. During this period, there were at least a dozen occasions where Roy Keane was unavailable for selection for Ireland yet played for his club the following weekend. I’m a fan of English soccer, no team in particular but any team that has an Irish man playing so this isn’t a rant against Man Utd. It galls me however to see Keane get up on his patriotic high horse and spend over 5 minutes at a conference having a pop at a team that were superb last Wednesday. Shay Given has been Ireland’s most consistent performer over the last 10 years and is a world class goalkeeper. He is now Ireland’s most capped player along with Kevin Kilbane, what sick satisfaction do you get Roy for having a pop at him? Did he not support you in Saipan? We all know from your incident with Alfie Hyland where you readily admitted that you wanted to “cripple him” that you are a vindictive person so maybe this is the sick Roy Keane raising his ugly head again.
For my 10cents worth Roy, stay that side of the pond along with your fellow Cobh man Stephen Ireland!!
Agreed, Johnny. – and he missed the key element of this debate – if you cheat and win, that’s OK.
I also gave up watching / following soccer a long time ago due to the amount of fouling, diving and other forms of cheating that are regular events. I look at rugby where you have big strong men slamming into the opposition full force, lots of blood etc, but very little cheating. I watch boxing, same result. Hurling where you have guys beating sticks off each other, still very little cheating. These are very tough sports, played by very determined people, but they don’t go out each time to cheat.
I find that soccer has been taken over by wimps who are getting too much money for what they do and feel that they need to resort to jersey pulling, pushing, diving expecting sympathy from the ref etc. I don’t think France deserved to go through, not because of the handball incident, but because they played sh1te and Ireland were definitely the better team. Henry knows that even if they won the world cup, they don’t deserve to win it. I’m not blaming him personally for handling the ball or that he deliberately done so, but he did handle it and that is the fact. Unfortunately,He is only doing what is done on a regular basis in soccer, and that is a pity, as it used to be a beautiful game.BM wrote:
– snooker is hardly a middle/upper class sport.
Yes, but it’s origins are upper class, surely. (Gentlemen playing billiards in the den, over a brandy and cigars).
This is the point I was trying to make. They were all amateur games in the beginning, and is it not a coincidence that the games that were originally played by the higher classes seem to retain more fair play & sportsmanship than the other games?
I reckon they do, and I think the reason why is because, there would be a sense of shame if you were to be caught cheating at these games in Victorian times.Soccer was a game for the “unwashed masses” in those times, where they might all pour out of a pub, playing twenty or thirty a side, where anything went, and sometimes the only thing that wasn’t kicked was the ball!
I mean, even the governing body is capable of obvious cheating.Anyway, with regard to “that” night.
I think people were so annoyed because:
1. The draw was rigged, and we got the most difficult opponents possible.
2. We had done more than enough in the 90 minutes to qualify outright.
3. Why couldn’t we have played like that in the other feckin’ matches.
4. The handball
5. The second handball
6. The ref not spotting it
7. The linesman not spotting it!!!!
8. Henry’s delight at scoring, then acting all contrite (and you know what contrite rhymes with)
9. The cheek of FIFA unfurling their “not worth the paper it’s written on” Fair Play banner.
10. Henry waiting for FIFA and French Football Federation saying there’ll be no replay, then coming out with his “replay is fairest” quote.I wouldn’t say Gillette will be too happy with him appearing with two “clean sportsmen” in future.
You get cheating in most fast and physical team sports…
Soccer
Rugby
Hurling
Football
Basketball
American Football
Ice Hockey
etcIt’s just the nature of the game.
Has nothing to do with class.
Rugby as well, but it’s called ‘gouging’ or ‘attempted murder’.
Remember Bloodgate?
Yes, you will get cheating in all sports, but it’s normally the people who are “losing” that resort to it. I’ve watched my home team doing it when they were behind with just a few minutes to go. They resorted to cheating, giving away frees and penalties and ended up completely losing because of it. I walked away,(a) disappointed at the loss and performance and (b) disgusted that they resorted to desparate measures but happy that the best team won in the end. The lesson that should have been learnt is that cheating works against you and not for you, but alas, this is not always the case. France resorted to cheating and were rewarded for it.
If it were England and not Ireland we’d all be having a laugh…
If it were Kazakhstan F.C. and not Ireland we wouldn’t care less…
It’s yesterday’s news now… time to move on (for me anyway)…
No Farmer’s Tans next Summer…
No “Ole, Ole, Ole”…
It could be worse.
It’ll be interesting if France are drawn against England in the World Cup…! I’d normally be an
anybody but England (ABE…???) but that may change..!!!Richie
richiehatch wrote:
It’ll be interesting if France are drawn against England in the World Cup…! I’d normally be an
anybody but England (ABE…???) but that may change..!!!Richie
Oh God/NFL – I hadn’t thought of that – actually wanting England to win …
Time for therapy …
Here’s something else that went unnoticed.
The pots have been set out for the world cup draw.
France are in pot one, along with the likes of England, Brazil, Argentina, Spain and Italy.
This means when the draw is made, these teams can’t meet (until later rounds provided they go through).However, had Ireland, not France qualified, we would have ended up in, I presume, the third pot.
Another case of FIFA fixing.
How can two teams face a play-off, and their grouping for the finals be completely different, depending on who wins?“Fair Play” me arse, Mr Bladder! :evil:
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