On the other hand, it could, after an operation lead to an unexpectedly straightforward recovery and he might be ready to play sooner.
The fact that the actual scoreline - the thing that determines where the points go - hinged on two incredibly controversial decisions.
Football is not decided on points or scores from a panel of judges. You can be the the best on the park and get nothing. You can be dogshit and come away with three points. Thatâs the nature of the sport.
Arsenal despite being the better side, needed a very dubious penalty, and to survive a stonewall handball shout against them to come away with the points. That means the performance of the referee matters.
Weâve had loads of game where weâve barrelled into the post match thread wondering how on earth we won that. Or how on earth we lost it. I could give you four examples just from European Cup finals. That could have very easily been one of those games where we came away with three points despite being second best. It doesnât detract from the performance in the slightest.
Only going on reports on LFC and TIAâŚ
A totally fair perspective. But in this instance has to balanced by where his hand was. The âunnatural positionâ element of the rule is there to essentially equate for deliberateness no matter the other circumstances of the incident. Materiality is also important. It was his out streteched arm that allowed him to defend the situation. He gained a material advantage from having his arm there and blocking it.
When there is a balancing of factors required there is not going to a clear right answer, but the weight put on the hand being at or above shoulder height is as close to a deterministic factor as there is.
Our squad is plenty big enough. It is right at the limit of what you are allowed to register, with additional kids who are expected to contribute not even included in that number. The issue is seemingly 3 fold.
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Too much faith retained in players who are seemingly no longer able to carry their weight (Naby, and Ox), which has pushed players like Milner and Carvalho into a more prominent position than Klopp was probably planning for them to have in a squad this big.
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Too many players who have been the foundation of our success being way off form.
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Impact injuries that cannot be accounted for, except for ensuring you have a big enough squad (and for that see above)
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While Arteta was 5 yards outside of his technical area, close enough to Gomez that he was borderline impeding his ability to take a run up to throw it. It was an astonishing piece of refereeing.
Thatâs not quite what he said. What he actually said was an insight into how convoluted the powers that be have made refereeing the game. Rather than sending off a player for a clearly dangerous and reckless challenge he instead went into a 10 dimensional differential diagnosis because that is how they are instructed to think about their decisions. By the time he worked his way through the entirety of the decision tree he was mentally so far away from the recklessness of the challenge he didnt think to revisit that issue and made the point that we didnt force the issue either. Of course, we were likely concerned at the health of defensive lynchpin.
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This a hundred times. That image of Keene screaming at the ref is all you need to see. Ref like they do in that weird oval ball game, disrespect the officials and youâre off on the FIRST offence. The idea of getting in the refâs ear and being bastards on the pitch is something that grass roots refs would absolutely love to advertise. As would the parents who encourage said conduct. Letâs take the whole game down to the lowest level where the most vile mouthed neanderthal wins the game through intimidation.
Yes, reductio ad absurdum.
He said this
âWhat I was surprised about looking at it afterwards was that nothing was expected on-field in terms of a red card. None of the players were asking for thatâ
I get totally that he got bogged down in trying to work out the offside. But that package also, I think shows, that Oliver is a referee who will be swayed by players asking for decisions.
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Wanting our team to do more of the dark arts is understandable, as we are being kicked out of it and not refereed fairly.
Arsenal are not a team regarded as cloggers. They have, to date, been the team that has played pretty football but has lacked that killer instinct, hence they have been nearly men for a while now.
But yesterday, while Iâm not condoning it, Martinelli left some on Trent and kicked him out of the game; and while that could be deemed a footballing incident, Partey on Diaz was more sinister.
So now we are waiting to see how badly injured two of our starters are, having been roughed up by Arsenal!
I donât know where it all ends, but we desperately need some more fight in the team. Obviously quality too, and athleticism, especially in the midfield.
Kone
Caicedo
Bellingham
Joao Gomes
Two of that group to refresh the engine room please. Chop most of the current crop and take a leaf out of Bob Paisleyâs book, and not let their legs go as our players.
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What I found quite shocking is that the Sky Sports lifted almost the entire Daily Mail piece word for word except this one sentence, as if Oliver effectively saying âyou donât get if you donât ask,: the players implement the rulesâ is inconsequential.
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If the ref reverses those decisions, it doesnât automatically mean the rest of the match plays out the same. They looked far more likely to score after we equalised. And they did. The fact that it was a dubious decision is deflecting that they were looking far more likely to score again. If it wasnât the peno it would have been from open play again with the pressure they had built.
We had numerous opportunities to clear our lines but gave it straight back to them each time. They would have made us pay at some stage.
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The pendulum and momentum of any game changes constantly during the 90mins⌠A bad decision that goes against us can disrupt our rhythm and concentration for anything from 5mins to an entire half.
It is crucial that the referee gets his decisions right 99% of the timesâŚ
If a decision is a close call, or he is unsure, like in the handball for the penalty, why the F*** canât he stop the game for a minute and go and look at the monitor at the side of the pitch before making a final judgement call⌠F*** VAR just do the sensible thing⌠he can add the stopped time on at the end of normal time⌠or is that suggestion too complicated for themâŚ
I am at a loss at how many times we are on the wrong side of decisions.
While the PL race has been neck and neck for the past few seasons, piss poor decisions going against us hit us a lot harder than the rest of the league⌠what does it matter if you finish 13th 14th 15th or 16th due to losing points courtesy of the referee⌠amassing 95points and still losing out on the title by one, is F***ing gallingâŚ!! Especially when the Cheaters have gained a good half dozen points during the same season because of biased refereeingâŚ!
Might just be a coincidence, but with Mike Riley covering his last season⌠What has he got to lose by priming the referees in each of our games, he is a mate of Old Whisky Nose after all
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Better from the officials and we could have won 2-3.
If that was how matches play out weâd have won every single league title since the season we won the Champions League.
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Agreed. We only look like we have control now when teams sit off us and allow us the ball. Thatâs what Arsenal did when they scored so early. Just sat back and tried to counter us. After it went 2-2 Arsenal took the game to us and we had no answer. We were just hanging on. Soft pen or not, there was only ever going to be one winner of that game and it wasnât going to be us.
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I donât think you can state that as a fact.
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A bit surprised when I went into work this morning and nearly all the Arsenal fans saying they got away with the penalty. A couple saying Tsimikas should have been sent off, personally I canât remember him doing anything to deserve it.
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Itâs stated as an opinion, not a fact.
There was 1 winner in the end and it wasnât us.
Thatâs a fact.
Nonsense. He very lightly brushed Jesus nose as they tussled for the ball, and Jesus pretended to be in obvious to get him sent. One of the more embarrassing incidents of play acting Iâve seen for a while.
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