Wilson and McCarra used to run the football unlimited guardian page and it was a standout. Unfortunately after his demise they went far too much into verbose prose hiring (albeit two good writers) non natural football peeps in Barney Ronay and Marina Hyde (who at least can write well and do now write across more weighty issues). This was then made much worse by adding an utter football nescience in Johnathan Liew. RIP footballunlimited.co.uk 
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Yup. A lot of the other writers do the acts of omission in their writing to create a false narrative. Jonathan Wilson gives the whole picture there.
Much like that spectre that follows Mourinho around of the âghost goalâ. Most writers even straight after that match conveniently disregard what wouldâve happened had the officials not thought it went over the line - namely penalty/red card combo in those days.
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Itâs one thing to let the game flow,so the gameâs not stopped for minor things,but a foul is a foul and if it leads to a goal then it should be looked at.There were 2 fouls in citys disallowed goal yesterday.Had there been 1 missed one you could maybe accept but 2 obvious fouls,without which the goal would not have been scored,cannot be overlooked because the ref said he wanted to keep the game flowing.Would we be even taking about it if there was an obvious deliberate handball in the build up to a goal.
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Much like THAT Everton game (two years ago today). Michael Oliver failed big time there. Let Everton do whatever. All could see that something would happen.
Richarlison went on to get red with putting Thiago out of action for some time as well. That could easily have been prevented by even a Sunday league ref with a bit of normal officiating.
Letting the game flow is good. Iâd say most of us want that. But you get games like in the Everton match where the ref decides he wants to be a super ref and show his prowess of letting the game run and give carte blanche to the snide pricks like Prickford, Ramos and Silva.
The three fouls on Salah all not given (by both ref and assistant) is just ridiculous. Then B Silva tries to goad Salah into a red card by trying to get Mo to touch him so he could collapse to the floor. Zen like Mo wonât fall for it.
Re Michael Oliver and Anthony Taylor - that these two have been selected for the WC is a Scooby Doo mystery.
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Itâs the day after, and it feels good!
Nice Jonathan Wilson article above, in the Guardian. Cheers. He has a small paragraph about Kloppâs comment on Friday about the ultimate impossibility of competing with a nation state club. He speculated that that had got under Pepâs skin, either because of the nature and purpose of government funding for Pepâs project, or because of the suggestion that Pep is playing the Premier League in an easier mode.
Bravo Jonathan Wilson.
More like this please. It is the most substantial story about Man City, and very few journalists ever touch on it, because they all pile into the spectacle - goal, red card, VAR, coins, fouls, and whatnot.
Iâm as interested in the details as every football fan. I want to dissect what we saw and so on, but we need journalists who will pick up on what Klopp said on Friday and keep the very significant story of financial cheating in play.
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The guidance this season is in its focus very good. Itâs often portrayed as just being about not giving soft fouls, but its really a more increased weighing of materiality. If contact was incidental and didnt impact the play then its not a foul. It why theatrical dives like Sanchoâs on Saturday justify the penalty not being given, because it is de facto evidence that the contact wasnt sufficient to affect him if he has to fabricate such a fall. Still a ton of grey area where reasonable people will disagree on where the line is drawn, but itâs the right focus. But when a goal scored after the ball is won back by wrestling the man in possession to the ground, how much more material can it get? The controversy is nonsense peddled only by those addicted to the controversy and who have either a pro-city or anti-liverpool agenda, and ignores the later foul that would also have seen the goal ruled out and the fact it should have been a corner not a goal kick in the first place.
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One of the interesting things I havent seen commented on anywhere was how anonymous De Bruyne was. He has been a big source of Halaandâs goals this season and so you cannot say the adjustments they have made to fit him in have hurt Kev, but whatever they tried to do yesterday that was Liverpool specific completely removed him from the game. I dont think Iâve ever seen a game in which he was less involved to the point that the only thing I can remember him doing was an uncharacteristic snidy off the ball foul on Carvalho late on.
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As for how the game was reffed, I applaud the intent to let it flow as much as possible. That is a good intent.
The application is where it falls apart, as there is a massive difference between letting the game flow, and letting every foul go unpunished.
It all needs judgment, and Antony Taylor fell short there.
Just one thing. The Foden âgoalâ. Nope. Never a goal. First it was a Liverpool corner. Ederson got a right hand on Moâs 1v1 and pushed it past the post. At first I thought it was a Mo miss, but it was more an excellent save.
Second, Haaland pulled Fabinho to the ground forcefully. There are matters of degrees, and a bit of pushing and shoving, or jostling, is increasingly being allowed. Generally Iâm ok with that, but in this instance, Haaland - a large man, a strong man - had a good hold of Fabinhoâs shirt and pulled him off the ball and to the ground.
Third, Alisson had the ball under control but Haaland kicked it out of his hands, then Foden finished it off. It was a neat finish, even if Joe Gomez almost kept it out, but there were a series of errors leading up to the âgoalâ and either of the Haaland fouls meant that the illegitimate goal did not stand.
Gary Neville is a sniveling little shit, and he is trying to get an anti-Fabinho narrative going, much like a few years ago the narrative around Salah got going, and because some pundits suggested he was a diver, we now have the ratio where six direct kicks on Mo will yield the same amount of penalties as one direct kick on Harry Kane.
The Bernardo Silva stuff on Mo late on was horrible to see. He was trying to pull him down and throw him over, in a twisted motion from underneath, a bit similar to Ramos. It was very dangerous, and itâs that sort of stuff that the referees are not seeing, which is why Klopp complained as he did.
Beyond that, if coins were thrown at Pep, there will be video footage and whoever did that should be banned. Iâd also like to see some censure for Pep, who seemed to be egging it on as he gesticulated wildly.
And then finally, City fans, or at least a sizable minority of them, were bang out of order for the chants and for the vandalism. Hopefully cctv will catch the Sharpie warriors and they will be banned.
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The kick after the ball has to be looked at. Either all officials and VAR missed it which means it is subject to post-game review and punishment, or they saw it and elected to ignore itâŠa blatant off the ball kick. If the latter then the whole group of officials need to be removed from the rotation.
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DejanâŠyouâre still playing your football in Russia, like really?
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I must admit that I did find it odd that the ref went back to the Fabinho foul before the disallowed goal.
He was looking right at it so why didnt he blow up then and there? Why did VAR have to tell him to take a look.
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To be honest, Barne Ronay might here show bias, but he hasnât hesitated denouncing the nation state football projects, just have a look through his artcles from the last two months:
And the Guardian do have another fantastic and knowledgeable writer, Sid Lowe, focused on Spanish football.
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He put his whistle to his mouth and then chickened out. That whole game was a truly disastrous display of officiating and City got away with murder. That theyâre now complaining about not being able to get away with another foul because of all the fouls they did get away with shows a remarkable lack of self awareness and a flagrant arrogance and entitlement. Cunts.
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Because that would mean a ref being half competent at his jobâŠwhich they are not.
VAR shouldnât need to be used as much as it hasâŠthe fact it is and that onfield refereeâs fall back on it this often tells you everything you need to know.
No confidence in their own decision making when it fucking matters.
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I missed that myself,did silva kick out at Salah?
Aside from everything else WTF has Taylorâs baldness while looking at the screen? Taylor was bald all game. He was bald when ignoring both fouls in the build up to the disallowed goal. That Barney Ronay is a feckin weirdo.
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Thatâs what made his post-match reports all the more surprising. As I posted earlier, I used to think he was pretty good, but the crap heâs come out with today has forced me to reassess him.
Sid Lowe, as you say, is quality.
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Yep. After they got to their feet he very clearly aimed a horse kick back at Mo. It wasnât picked up by any of the match cameras, but someone did show footage of it earlier in this thread. That was seemingly why there was such a confrontation afterwards when Klopp was being sent off.
EDIT It was Sixpence in post 232. It was a reddit post with fan filmed footage. The post is still up but the video appears to have been taken down.
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Itâs still there.Looks like he threw the left elbow as well.
Kicked him slyly but in front of the linesman
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