Sarah #002

Before I start let me just comment on Kayannie’s post. I completely agree with her about capping the kiddies. Fat!Dukes is ambivalent about playing for his country anymore, Timmy Cahill was also surrounded by rumours that he too would concentrate more on Everton then Australia, and as for Harry Kewell well who knows what Hazza is up to these day, not to mention John Aloisi is now a club-less bum. I say we let the kids have a go, at least ‘snag em’ before another country poaches them. Matty Spiranovic has already had Croatia trying to woo him, so why didn’t we just put him on for the last two minutes of the Uruguay friendly? He was practically sitting in Australia’s palm, yet my favourite organisation in the world didn’t think “I know, we shall cap him and then we can really stick it to Croatia”, the mind boggles. So we know what the problem is, but the question is do they have the balls* to do something about it.

Now let me get onto what I really want to bitch about, The FFA, again and I do excuse myself for not making this sound logical or as eloquent as it sounds in my head. I feel like they are running in circles, getting slightly paranoid and I am not far from likening them to Pol Pot and his happy followers, but give me a few more weeks and I will get there. Okay, so they are going a little over the top with being cautious about players doing the wrong thing. For example I am just going to use Terry McFlynn, I don’t even remember him doing anything wrong on game day, I don’t even remember now what he did. yet he was put on trial and I can’t even remember the other players that were summoned before a Spanish inquisition and only after round one!

I know Danny Tiatto has been slammed a few times for tackles that the FFA aren’t liking and last week a Central Coast player was redded just like Corica when he made a tackle on Matt McKay. I know that if studs are up and contact is made it’s a red and if studs are up in tackles but no contact is made with the other player then it’s a yellow. He didn’t make contact, and was redded for putting the ball out of play after winning it! Every little tackle and foul, seems to be coming under scrutiny and I think it is putting players off trying anything, and I do mean anything even scoring! I don't understand how they can pull up video evidence to go on power trips and line everyone in front of a firing squad yet the FFA won't allow a review for red cards (which every league in the world allows).

If daddy Culina can’t get away with saying this, I shall do it for him, REFEREES YOU SUCK, they are doormats and the FFA are OBVIOUSLY incompetant tools. I agree that if a referee needs protecting from the crowd, especially in the a-league, something was not right. His red on Corica was a little too quickly shown maybe a rash decision, I know Victory fans won’t agree with me but let’s say it was Pantaledis who got the red? Corica was in the area, and turned, Pantaledis just happened to cop a graze off Steve’s boot, he didn’t maliciously dig it in and I don’t think he thought “Yes, I shall get Pantaledis”. I really can’t express what I think of that situation, it makes me mad.

At the moment, every time a player goes into a tackle, whether it’s my team or another team, I am worried that the ref will be a lap dog to the FFA and book them, and in a lot of cases might book them unjustly. That said, if a player decides that smacking a ref assistant in the groin is necessary* it’s okay, the FFA don’t care, they turn a blind eye and let the club deal with it not to mention the fact that if you hit a ref/linesman while playing in a local comp, you'll most likely be banned for a year. This is becoming too much, and I am not touching diving with a 10 foot pole because that’s just out of my league*.

In my final conclusion, whose decision was it to let Kevin Muscat play with a plaster cast on his arm? On field, Muscat is a very physical and very angry player, so why would you let a physically angry player on field with a weapon attached to him? Ladies and Gentlemen, this question alone is reason to think “are the FFA brainless morons?!”

Sarah

*no pun intended
*no pun intended.
* i don't condone the castration of referee assistants (just the organisation of which they are apart)