Feigning injury would help in a way, unfortunately. I believe that if a player goes down "injured" and needs treatment, they should have to sit a minimum of 2 minutes. If players are really as injured as they act sometimes, there is no way they should be able to continue the match so I think 2 minutes off seems reasonable.

Wash your mouth out Ajay.

Punishing a player for the actions of another is too far Pat. All they do is concede a free kick and the innocent party are down to ten men.

I'd much rather there was a facility to cite particular examples of foul play or cheating & a suitably zealous panel reviewing the evidence & dishing out severe punishment to both players & their clubs. Although the disciplinary action would be retrospective, if applied effectively it would curtail the worst excesses.

It isn't punishment so much, Nick. If you go down and you need the entire game stopped so you can have treatment, you really can't continue. Head injuries and blood would be the exceptions to that. It would encourage players who aren't really that hurt to grow a pair and make their way to the sidelines instead of holding everything up.

Different Countries and Games but the Australian Rugby League has a retrospective justice(?) system and has, unless memory is failing me, ruled on some Suarez-Distin/Mirallas-type situations after the weekend's run of games.

They regularly assess 'iffy' tackles (as indicated by the Ref with crossed arms above head) who will at the time punish the 'offender' on the field with a penalty (free-kick in football terms) to see if further punishment is required.

If they decide further punishment IS required the offender can 'take' a statutory one-match ban by pleading guilty or can contest it and risk a two- or three-match ban — or more. Most plead guilty and take the one-match ban. Of those who appeal not very many are successful.

This of course will not happen here as the dummies at the Prem/FA will have nothing to do with something that radical (and seemingly simple).

And that inertia, amongst other things,is what is wrong with the Game

Derek # 024, I'm not a great fan of Rugby or AFL over here but they do have the retrospective option of punishing foul play
.
During the AFL season the sports news is full of players being sited for "rough play" (quite how that is possible in such a physical sport, I don't know) and other offences which were not dealt with during the course of the match.
AFL umpires appear to avoid much of the criticism our refs get because they are backed by such a retrospective video system and although I'm not an expert I don't believe umpires actually have the power to send a player from the field of play.

A similar system would make it much harder for weasels such as Suarez to hide behind the intensity of the match where refs have to make snap decisions.

At the end of the day - we can criticise refs as much as we like but with the technology currently available, the way they are exposed week in week out by the FA and then massacred for 'poor' decisions is an absolute disgrace. If I can make a more informed judgement by watching my TV from 12,000 miles away than the ref can about key decisions during any game is crazy.

Pat. A player who receives treatment already has to leave the pitch and wait for the referee to signal for him to re-enter the fray. It's a stupid rule that was supposed to cut out play-acting. All it does is disrupt the game further. A 90-minute game is lucky if it has half of that time as "active play".

You're right Matt, it was supposed to stop all that. All it did was increase it as it allows one side to disrupt another's momentum and Pat's solution is no different and also increases the benefits of nobbling someone.

If physios were allowed on like in rugby then it really would stop the nonsense. And if someone had to be stretchered off you've already gone through the time consuming magic sponge stage.

Not quite on subject, I know, but seeing as the weasel is mentioned. Did you see Coloccini's red card? He should learn from the master of that kind of tackle, aim lower down the leg; more damage and only a yellow card.

Think this is a tricky one because Suarez's challenge on Mirallas is not as obviously deliberate (IMHO) as the way he got at Distin. In fact, if he hadn't then gone after Distin I don't think a lot of people would be so convinced that he actually tried to injure Mirallas at all. I think a citing facility in football would be overwhelmed by a lot of marginal decisions, whereas serious foul play in rugby tends to be easier to pick out and label as such.

Likewise, playing on and allowing physios on without stopping play is not as suited to football as it is to rugby. The way the ball and the players move around the pitch does not really work when a portion of the playing area becomes a no go area, whereas a lot of rugby can be played on a significantly narrowed pitch. Not sure how it would potentially impact some off-side situations as well.

The pressure on Referees could be eased by delegating responsibility for some of their simpler duties.

Official time keepers who respond to a clear signal from the referee by stopping and restarting the clock. Time added to be clearly indicated on big screens. Such a thing would allow the ref to concentrate solely on the game and put a stop to 'Fergie' time arguments.

An injury that causes a stoppage in play must be serious enough to require the injured party to be sidelined for the same amount of time. If a foul is considered to be responsible for it the perpetrator should be penalised and sidelined for the same amount of time as the injured player.

Si Cooper, I agree that the Mirallas challenge was not as bad as the one on Distin, but it was late, and deserved a booking.

Jim (#227), think how swamped they would be if the system had to look at all possible bookings as well as potentially malicious play... and then you would have to look at over-turning wrong decisions to even everything up.

I wasn't defending the challenge, just saying that realistically you have to draw the line somewhere.

I definitely don't like the idea of keeping a player off for as long as the injured player. It encourages people to fake injuries even more. When Sewerez fouled Distin, if that rule were in play, we could take Distin off for the rest of the game. That removes Sewerez and it's a solid 10 players for us while they're without their best player.

Si Cooper, Fair point.

Ajay, unlike Nick 867, I think this is a great point and thus a good article worthy of discussion

Do we need to make more of our injustices in order to get a fair rub of teh green? Perhaps

I have no doubt that Suarez got Rodwell sent off last season because of the Shite's constant bleating about being hard done by etc ahead of the game. they created the atmosphere whereby the ref was pychologically under pressure

Moyes has recognised this and ahead of games such as the Man U semi (where Welbeck should have had a pen) and recent derbies he's asked for a 'strong ref' and recognition of diving and a fair ref........he's highlighted that the refs performance will be scrutinised and thus he's better get the big decisions correct. It's quite possible Moyes managed to get the Shite's 'winner' chalked off with his pre match comments (I think it should have been disalloed anyway cos their defender took a ride on Jags when heading it down)

So for ppl to come on here and say they don't want the ref pressurised - well presumably they would have been 'happy' for us to have lost that game then?

Fact is that refs ARE pychologically effected. Unfortunately to teh outside world, we're not a big club and don't have much gravitas. Hence why Moys picks and chooses when to put the ref under pressure (if he did it all the time it wouldn't work)

Should Mirrallas have made more of the foul & injury - I think it would have benefitted us in the long run

Do I want EFC players to play act? In theory 'no'

Do I want a fair rub of the green? Definitely

Is making the most of a genuine injury a way of ensuring fairness? Quite possibly

We can't MAKE the FA do anything like retrospective action. The question that Ajay poses is: should we be doing all that we can effect in order to get justice? And it's a strong striong question