Arsenal consistently play the best football in England.

Arsenal have the most talent coming through their academy.

Arsenal have the best manager in the premier league.

Arsenal forever.

however it was all tempered by the fact that he played for manu and SIR alex ferguson. one of the queens own, british through and through. the same goes for most manu players who over the years have behaved like this.

when i saw it, my initial reaction (always the best imho) was that he was running out of space, the goalie was coming at him and he jumped over any potential collision. he didnt look for the penalty.

watching it again from many different angles, it doesnt look as good. there is minimal contact but the way he falls implies more contact. i dont know if he was looking for a decision, but on the face of it, watching those replays i can understand celtic fans being miffed that the penalty was given.

itv were brutal last night, the two commentators were laying into our team from the off. i dont know how many times they mentioned that gallas had been ’stripped’ of the captaincy, or how his last two goals were off his back and chin.

obviously celtic started brightly, they had to. they interceted well and their outnumbered midfield performed excellently. but it was obvious to anyone watching that we had bucketloads more class, yet the commentators seemed to be watching a different game.

after the penalty it got worse, they had a bone, and they chewed it, all through the rest of the half. then they passed it to the studio who chewed it some more.

i was happy when the mrs commandeerd the telly and i had to get a stream on the pc going. poor quality picture, but high quality commentary, chinese, or korean maybe. i couldnt understand a word but i could still hear the crowd. result.

of course the press is going to have a field day on the back of this. theres bugger all else going on in english football, apart from our great start to the season, and that is never going to make headline news eh?

Untold Arsenal has formally demanded that UEFA and FIFA investigate the Scottish Football Association for gross incompetence.

Among the complaints made are

1. When there is a real case to answer on an issue they do next to nothing. They did nothing for years to stop the singing of the racist Famine Song by Rangers supporters, despite a ruling in the Justiciary Appeal Court showing that this is racist.

2. They have shown total and absolute incompetence in overseeing negotiations for Scottish football on TV, with the result that Scotland’s football is now a laughing stock, and the clubs are sitting there without money. A deal with Sky when offered would have given them much more money than they now have – but they turned it down, taking their regular “we know best” attitude.

3. They failed to act when it was clear that there could be problems in Manchester when Rangers appeared there.

4. They have the idea that they can be judge and jury (as with the Eduardo case yesterday), arguing not just for a hearing, but for the result of a hearing, before the hearing takes place. It is as if they have watched Liverpool supporters complain about court rulings they don’t like, and thought, oh that is how justice works. They are utterly ignorant of the notion of fair hearings, and of giving any accused person the chance to put a case, of reviewing all the evidence, and having fair representation before judgement is made. As such they are utterly unfit to be involved in any form of activity involving players and clubs and should be disbanded.

5. The SFA thinks it is fine to postpone matches at very little notice as when Rangers were due to play Forfar recently but then called off the match just four hours before kick off, with many Rangers fans already on the way. The match was called off due to the weather – but the weather was exactly as the weather forecast said it would be. Maybe before judging Eduardo they should get themselves a TV with teletext.

6. In November 2006 SFA chairman Taylor said that the SFA take racism “very seriously”. Yet, at that moment, an e-mail was sentto non-league Spartans that effectively said they had no right to appeal a “could not be proved” verdict on their complaint that Whitehill Welfare player Wayne McIntosh called another player “a black bastard” during an East of Scotland league game.
Despite Spartans lodged an initial report that named the player who had witnessed the abuse and gave details of other witnesses. But the wonderful SFA heard no direct evidence from anyone before deciding that they could not act.

I could go on, but really, the SFA is just a total embarrassment to all of football, and should be wound up at once.
Tony Attwood

The thing about diving in Britain is that it’s nothing more than a cultural taboo. The Times came out yesterday and said as much – this is a part of public expectation of players’ behavior, not a technical issue. In the moralist eyes of the paper, Eduardo has committed a sin. Period.

Technically, most players at the top level these days are educated to control their fall to protect their body, with or without contact from opponents – do you ever wonder how Ronaldo stayed fit for so long despite being the most fouled player in the league? I don’t like his style, but it worked. Tactically, your willingness to be “feather light” adds a dose of uncertainty into tacklers’ mind. This too increases your protection.

The line between controlled falling and simulating a foul is sometimes thin. Like the one we saw last night. Dudu might have fallen because he expected contact. When he realized non was there it was already too late; he already lost his footing while momentum was pushing him forward. He might have said to himself “So what? A yellow is all it’ll take.” (People only remember successful diving, we all forget the yellow cards doling out for failed efforts)

In fact, when a diver gets what he wants, the only sin committed is one by the referee – he fails to do what he’s there to do. When more and more players think it’s a good idea to foul, the sin is on the regulating body – they fail to construct reasonable rules and reinforcing rules (by technology or more referees) to deter players.

I’m not amoral, I think rules should be set up to prevent diving efficiently. They should do so by punishing the diver properly. But they should also punish diving players to free them from fans’ judgment, which are very often inflated by emotion and unjust.

Going back to our players, I must say I feel very unjust for Eboue. One fall and he earned the title diver forever – the one at the CL final game and it wasn’t even for a penalty. No-one ever wants to hear the man defend himself. We all are so sure of our moral authority that none was necessary.

Doubt Cesc will be played on Saturday other than as a 60+ min sub. It may be the best time to play United before their team gels properly post Ronaldo’s departure. Rooney is the main threat.

Small nicks by the bat on the ball can hardly make the ball deviate and impossible to see by eye or on the replay. However the ’snic ommeter’ and the infra red camera clearly demonstrate that the batsmen has made contact with the ball – ( I suspect that often the batsman is unsure if he has made contact it would be interesting to get some views on this from an international batsman!)
Low down catches are prime examples where frame by frame review has failed to convince me wether the catch has been made or not.

It is going to be really difficult to take into account the momentum of the player (especially at speed) and that a small contact can have a large effect, the fact that the player will be trying to avoid injury if they can see a collision coming up and will be in an unnatural position anyway.

I think the Cricket examples show how TV replays cannot show small contacts and also the diffiulty of determination of what happened first (in a low catch ball touching ground or fingers first) Player being fouled or falling over first

Anyway food for thought. As I said above(Diminedave misspelt) I thought it a dive but some of the TV angles do appear to how contact on a standing leg so there you go inconclusive!

about the Eduardo dive — anything that gets Arsenal 3 points/victory is fine by me. As a bonus it got Boruc worked up — so please dive some more.

Now the only concern — “cheating” Arsenal denied a genuine penalty at Old Trafford; Rooney does what he does — cheat,moan,flail arms around, bully to victory against Arsenal.

Tony, I agree totally about Pires being maligned as a posterboy for diving in spite of the fact I too can only recall the infamous Fulham incident in his career. But let’s not kid ourselves on that particular day that WAS a blatant dive by Pires.

To me it’s important to be able to try and look at the incidents objectively – how would one have reacted if it had happened against The Arsenal?

In both cases (IMHO) they were clear cut dives – but it is sad that the media and pundits all gang up to scapegoat one player in particular forever more.

The rest of the so called analysis – —just makes me mad sitting here typing and thinking about it – Drivel (kinda like that word – sounds as it means – half arsed miserable crap!) – nuff said.

Looked to me like a dive but you win some and loose others – If they wish to start retrospective action on incidents like that they must warn all players well beforehand and then be consistent in their approach – will that be done who knows

come on the arse

Almunia

Sagna
Vermaelen
Gallas
Clichy

Denilson
Song
Eboue (Right)
Eduardo (Left)
Arshavin (through the middle)

Van Persie