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Wear Red, See Yellow

June 16th, 2006 | By: Stacy-Marie Ishmael | 14 Comments »

I’m not impressed by the Crouch Incident. I’m even less impressed by the argument that “it’s football and these things happen”, primarily in light of the way that the T&T games have been refereed.

I concede that Avery John deserved a yellow card for his first tackle, and that he was almost asking for the second call. I agree that T&T play a physical game. I wholly and utterly refute the claim that we are unwarrantedly violent, play unfairly or are ‘wilder’ than any other team.

The number of yellows were slapped with yesterday seems, at the very least, arbitrary.

Thoughts?

Tags: England, Peter Crouch, Soca Warriors, Trinidad and Tobago, yellow cards

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Comments

By Sanjiva | June 16th, 2006 at 1:06 pm

I usually try to stay away from bashing the ref, but I think you have a valid point. Just because we are physical and “get stuck in” doesn’t make us wild, and we definitely didn’t deserve all those bookings. This is a bit ridiculous:

18′ D. Theobald
19′ A. Whitley
45′ K. Jones
47′ S. Hislop
56′ C. Gray

Posted from United Kingdom

By Sanjiva | June 16th, 2006 at 1:24 pm

Oh, and Happy belated Birthday!

Posted from United Kingdom

By Vin | June 16th, 2006 at 2:10 pm

It was by far the WORST thing I have seen in the World Cup thus far. Justice was not served. We can only hope that the English media gets a hold of this and rakes Crouch over the coals.

Posted from United States

By stacy-marie ishmael | June 16th, 2006 at 3:23 pm

Sanjiva - thank you.

Vin - it’s hardly about, a mention on the BBC, but with the title “Sancho claims foul” or similar.

Posted from United Kingdom

By Rhythmwize | June 16th, 2006 at 4:19 pm

FIFA is trying to clean up the game and get more scoring but it appears the refs are going overboard with the yellows in many cases. Ive seen a couple times where yellows were issued and replays showed it wasnt even a foul. The grumbling will really start when many players get a second yellow and will be suspended for a game.

As far as the Crouch goal goes, that is one shocking video. Watching it live, I didnt see the foul but something didnt look right with the way it was defended…like Sancho was out of position to jump and challenge for the cross and now, perhaps we know why.

Posted from United States

By LEANNA | June 16th, 2006 at 5:17 pm

I WANT A REPLAY I THINK MY COUNTRY TRINIDAD AND TOBAGO WOULD GIVE ENGLAND A FIGHT LIKE THAT AGAIN ANYWHERE ANYTIME BOO FOR CROUCH

Posted from Trinidad And Tobago

By Jeremy Taylor | June 16th, 2006 at 6:25 pm

Apparently the rulebook says that White Shirts suffer collisions while Red Shirts commit fouls.

Posted from Trinidad And Tobago

By stacy-marie ishmael | June 16th, 2006 at 6:34 pm

Jeremy - your blog is very good indeed.

Posted from United Kingdom

By Dickon Springate | June 16th, 2006 at 9:10 pm

Definetly a bad day for being English … no wonder I want to leave this country so badly at times.

Posted from United Kingdom

By Troglydyte | June 16th, 2006 at 10:42 pm

Crouch’s little tug was reprehensible. Unfortunate that he stained England’s victory that way, but also unfair to generalize to the entire English team.

I’ve heartily enjoyed watching T&T play. Shakka Hislop, with whom I happen to share a variation of a surname, has turned in an exciting and persuasive performance. None of his saves could be dismissed as lucky.

But going too far down the chain of causation to reverse engineer a tie or a defeat for England if only it hadn’t happened is kind of pointless. Crouch may have lended a dubious goal, but he also choked hard on a handful of solid scoring opportunities — entirely unforced errors, in fact — that should have been easy.

Arguably, his poor finishing hurt England more than his hair-pulling helped.

Also, the bystanders who dismiss England for coming up dry so often against T&T are not doing the Soca Warriors proper justice. Such judgments require a condescending underestimation of T&T that they’re better off without.

Posted from United States

By owen | June 17th, 2006 at 12:11 am

nice comment there trogly

and I completely agree about the yellows stacy-marie - I would NEVER have called T&T wild or even rough. Touch certainly, going in hard certainly. To be fair to the england players I don’t think you see them complaining or getting mad or doing any more than the heat of the moment (except for crouch’s hair thing - and see trogly for that)

refs are supposed to be calling offsides looser too and I haven’t seen that apart from the very first game

Posted from United States

By Dan | June 17th, 2006 at 9:45 am

Dickon Springate then go! Leave! No-ones stopping you, whinger.

Posted from United Kingdom

By Anil | June 17th, 2006 at 12:00 pm

Stinky Crouch!, Boooooo! last minute dirty move by him (hair pulling), he should not paly in the next few games and should be embarrassed to show his face in england. Refs should be allowed to see replay to make goal official if appeal is made, what can be done about this in football? Win with pride not with a dirty move like that, he is already so tall, why Crouch? You will get what is comming to you…….

Posted from Canada

By Ray | June 19th, 2006 at 7:23 am

I’ve watched a few matches including TT vs England. From the start it was obvious this referee was totally enamoured with the English side and overwhelmed by the moment.

I am surprised he simply didn’t start asking for autographs while dishing out yellow cards to T&T.

Other matches have had similar results. Out of control referess trying to influence the game or get their names in the press or both.

FIFA should be embarassed with the lack of quality and total lack of evenhandedness.
It almost appears the fix is in for some of these matches.

As for Crouch, he proved to be a dirty player through out the match. He should have been carded at least once, not including his goal in which the foul was so obvious only this ref(?)could have missed it.

Even the English players seemed embarassed by it all as it ruined what was a cliff-hanger match.

Posted from United Arab Emirates