Ghana vs Uruguay:don't read if you don't want to know result!

[Anonymous]

Hey fellows. FIFA's looking into whether Suarez's one red card is enough of a penalty. Is this a girl response, too?

http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2010/soccer/world-cup-2010/07/03/suarez.ban.ap/index.html?section=si_latest

[Anonymous]

Why would you give the manager a card? Why fine the team? This wasn't a calculated strategy, it was a spur of the moment action. Suarez may now be suspended for the subsequent game after the semi's as way. FIFA has the leeway to extend suspensions for unsportsmanlike red cards beyond the mandatory one-game ban. That might be justified in this case.

Suarez/Uruguay didn't "cheat". Suarez committed a penalty and was penalized appropriately. 9 times out of 10, if not more, Ghana converts the PK and this isn't even an issue. That's not to say it's particularly "fair" but that's the way the game breaks sometimes.

Again, I was rooting for Ghana. But dems da breaks.

[Anonymous]

12:33 I never said he cheated, and I really don't appreciate whichever poster called questioning his handball a "girl response." Obviously FIFA is thinking the way I think more than the way you think -- which is that one red card is not sufficient. Why not card the manager for a goal-blocking handball like that? We'd never see reflexive handballs again! As for Ghana not making the PK, what are the stats in such high-stakes circumstances? That 90% is an average.

[Anonymous]

FIFA is NOT saying that one red card is not sufficient. A red card for unsportsmanlike conduct is a MINIMUM one game ban with the possibility for extension. That is already written in to the rule and they make invoke it here. So there is no evidence that FIFA feels the existing rules are insufficient. You can make up facts or you can deal in reality. You are entitled to your position and I wouldn't say it's a completely irrational one, but I don't agree with it. But your claim that FIFA shares your perspective is simply not backed up by ANY evidence.

[Anonymous]

And your theory that carding the coach or fining the team will prevent this is nonsense. How would the coach have prevented this from happening? How would the team's organizing committee stop it?

[Anonymous]

13:34 If FIFA is reviewing whether one red card is sufficient, and they are, they're thinking is more in line with mine than yours since you've previously posted one red card was enough, that's the rule, tough break for Ghana for missing the PK. (It's there in writing!) Of course I know FIFA would NEVER add a law that red-carded a manager for such an offense. It's a fantasy that tough laws were serve as deterrents to egregious fouls. It will be interesting to see where FIFA comes down on this. I hope it's more than one red card because blocking a goal with your hands in the final moments of an overtime World Cup qualifier of historic proportion is not the spirit of the game. Not in the least. Unless you subscribe, as many do, to the win at any cost thinking.

[Anonymous]

Them's the breaks. AND this is from an Irish person, who watched the disgraceful Henry handball to put us out. The rules cannot be written for every eventuality. Any professional player would have done the same - it just sucks for the receiving end. There were much more actual "unfair" things to happen at the WC this year.

[Anonymous]

It is a girl response. Get over it. It is a game. We're not determining how foreign aid is distributed. Ghana played a game and lost. Stop making more out of it than it is.

[Anonymous]

Op the rules are the rules, sucks if you don't like them

[Anonymous]

I don't think you understand the rules. Only one red card is being given out. A red card can result in a one or multi-game ban. Other red cards have led to multi-game bans. So in investigating that, they are not saying that one red card was not enough. What is so hard so understand about that?

And FIFA ultimately ruled that the one-game ban would hold and no more. Maybe he should have received a 2 game ban but, even if he did, it would have been within the existing enforcement of a red card for unsportsmanlike.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:10:02 I watch soccer all the time. My son plays travel soccer and on his school team. We've gone to dozens of professional games. We watch on television, too. Lots of men and boys think this was a cheap, questionable move. What's next? Spitting at an opponent who's trying to score? Is that acceptable? As for Ghana not making the PK, there would not have been one if Suarez had used his head. Or tried to. This is soccer, not volleyball. By the way, this is a longstanding problem with soccer. The penalty kick was introduced in 1891 to penalize this very thing. The laws of soccer evolve.

10:31 Intentional fouling is one thing but using your hands i soccer to block a goal is quite another.

I would argue that you might want to watch league soccer (not your son's travel team) to understand the game more.

Oh please, what Suarez did was cheating out right and calling it girl move or asking us how often we watch soccer does not make it sportsmanlike, the win was ugly and undeserved.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:13:34 If FIFA is reviewing whether one red card is sufficient, and they are, they're thinking is more in line with mine than yours since you've previously posted one red card was enough, that's the rule, tough break for Ghana for missing the PK. (It's there in writing!) Of course I know FIFA would NEVER add a law that red-carded a manager for such an offense. It's a fantasy that tough laws were serve as deterrents to egregious fouls. It will be interesting to see where FIFA comes down on this. I hope it's more than one red card because blocking a goal with your hands in the final moments of an overtime World Cup qualifier of historic proportion is not the spirit of the game. Not in the least. Unless you subscribe, as many do, to the win at any cost thinking.

ITTTTTTA.
I am hoping for a complete comeuppance for Uruguay. And hopefully a game where they learn a bit about what it is that makes soccer a beautiful game, where unsportsmanship and cheating should not belong.

[Anonymous]

Whoever said that cheats never prosper? Not in this World Cup tour de farce. What a joke. First the goal that never was, then the unilateral repudiation of the offside rule for major footballing nations and now this. What sort of example is Suarez, Uruguay's latest hero, to the youth of the world? Play up play up and play the game? I don't think so. Cheat early cheat often is obviously FIFA's motto. I would be ashamed if my country's football team had stooped so low to win a game. No doubt the cheats are dancing in the streets of Montevideo.

Shame FIFA shame! The sooner FIFA spend more time fixing the notable flaws in its administration of the game, and less time preening in front of fawning world leaders desperate to have some crumbs of Blatter's beneficence bestowed on them, the sooner the game will be in a far healthier condition. Then perhaps football will become a sport we can admire again. If FIFA cannot put its own house in order, the UN should send in a peacekeeper and stabilisation force to occupy FIFA's corrupt festering offices in Zurich and clean out their augean stables once and for all.

As for me, I've stopped watching. I don't care which cheats win anymore.

[Anonymous]

PP I understand the rules. Of course a red card can mean more than one game sitout. As for FIFA's ultimate decision regarding Suarez, if Uruguay plays in the final, that stadium is going to be one charged venue.

FYI: http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5i5buRPHf80YvXKFsQE2eFWjjUqLgD9GNP4Q80

[Anonymous]

So you found someone in support of your position. I didn't say your position regarding the length of the suspension was off-base, just that your idea about penalizing/fining the coaches and teams was irrational and would not fix the problem. You argued that "more than a red card" was needed when it's not, because a red car allows for multiple game suspensions.

While we're bashing cheaters, are we going to say anything about the German goal who admitted that he knew the English goal was good but quickly grabbed the ball and threw it out to fool the ref? That certainly seems unsportsmanlike.

Suarez's play was against the rules and was penalized. And it was a shit ending to the game. But what do you want to do about it? Lots of games have shit endings. Sometimes there are rules that can be changed and sometimes there is nothing you can do about it. Unfortunately, you can't assume the goal; otherwise, you'd have to give refs discretion on every defensive handball in the box (which there are more of than you'd realize). It's an automatic red card, send off, and suspension from at least one more game. What more can be done?