There are many things within the world of football that irritate me. The price of tickets and ‘captive-audience’ refreshments, obscene wages, hysterical fans and knee-jerk reactionism thanks to the benefit of hindsight are all amongst them but none of those do so in quite the same way that cheating does. Specifically diving. I refer to it as cheating because that is exactly what it is. Cheating. Not simulation or exaggerating contact in order to bring it to the attention of the match officials, just plain cheating.
Cheating is defined as “to act dishonestly or unfairly in order to gain an advantage” which, to me, perfectly describes the actions of some that we see on the football pitch with disappointing and alarming regularity. Long gone are the days that self-righteous English football fans could point the finger accusingly in the general direction of either South America or Continental Europe and say that ‘they’re the ones to blame’ as nowadays one of the chief culprits and serial offenders of this vile footballing disease is one of our own. I use that term extremely loosely as Ashley Young is in no way a player that I would wish to claim as ‘my own’ thanks to a tarnished reputation which is plumbing new depths with every highly-practiced display of cheating that he commits. If you were to review a silhouetted still image of the moment that Young commits one of his numerous acts of deception, I am confident that anyone who watches Premier League football with any regularity would be able to identify him, and not just thanks to his nanochephalic build.
Football in England has evolved massively from the old days of terracing, tackling and tough men with many supporters uncomfortable with the current state of the game. Again, right towards the top of any list of their irritations will be the seemingly endless rise in the shameless nature of modern-day footballers. Had a player rolled around on the floor in the manner players do at the slightest contact nowadays back in the 1970’s, they would have been at danger of getting a further booting whilst they were down there, not to mention the obvious fact that the willingness to make a show of yourself by feigning injury at the slightest of touches just wasn’t there.
With Premier League football being broadcast to every corner of the Globe, the embarrassing sight of players flinging themselves over defenders legs, their faces contorted in a grotesque show of faux pain is certainly not the kind of image that we want associated with what was once The Beautiful Game. Fans of other sports rightly point and ridicule these players whilst talking up the more hardened nature of their own favoured sport, with rugby enthusiasts particularly vocal in their disgust. There are however things that go on on a rugby pitch that would see a footballer doing similarly facing a spell at Her Majesty’s pleasure so I don’t fully subscribe to the sporting comparisons. That said though, football is certainly at a crossroads with how to deal with the issue and the authorities need to get it right for the good of the game and the next generation of youngsters who have no recollection of footballers that a feather couldn’t topple. With that in mind, I find it extremely unhelpful to hear managers continually skirt around the issue and defend their most fragile of stars after each repeated infringement on the values of the game such as David Moyes apparent shrug of the shoulders at his players latest pathetic showing.
So what is the solution?
The current approach of accepting that their is a problem whilst seemingly doing little to tackle it head on is helping nobody. Panels comprising ex-footballers, coaches and referees need to be convened whenever the need arises in order to analyse each individual case, with the culprits brought before a disciplinary panel with the requisite power and authority to make a difference to their attitude and on-field instincts going forward. Multiple game bans need to be as widespread as the condemnation is following each high-profile incident such as Ashley Young for Manchester United last night against Real Sociedad in the Champions League.
These panels need to look closely at each reported incident and ascertain whether the player is deliberately looking to gain an unfair advantage (cheating) or whether there was genuine contact – and in certain situations, contact can be absolutely minimal but still be enough to send the player tumbling when running at pace.
Until things begin to change, football is in real danger of having more people fall out of love with the game due to it being a shadow of the game it was when they first began watching.
Managers and coaches also need to adopt a tougher approach to players within their squads who employ such nefarious tactics in search of maximum points as I find it hard to believe that these antics are not practiced heavily on the training pitches, so polished and repetitive are the actions of some of the worst offenders.
Ashley Young – I am looking at you.
Fines do not hit professional footballers at the top level in the same way that suspensions would do. Until that happens with the same regularity that these unsavoury tactics currently are, football will find itself fighting a losing battle against the cheats.
