Sometimes I think Steven Howard is just a mythical character, created by the demons at The Sun to fulfil an antagonistic role that no credible journalist could ever occupy.
Here are some choice highlights from Howard’s write-up of yesterday Chelsea/United game:
Enter the clod-hopping Clattenburg in the 63rd minute.
OK, we’ll give him the benefit of the doubt over the first red card that reduced Chelsea to 10 men. Not that I want to.
But people keep banging on about how rules are rules and if a forward (Ashley Young) bites the dust when pursued by a defender (Branislav Ivanovic) and if that defender is the last defender even though contact is minimal then… on yer bike, son.
Learn the rules. There’s nothing about ‘the last man’, that’s a lazy misconception – the rule predicates that ‘denying an obvious goal-scoring opportunity’ warrants a red card. And ‘benefit of the doubt’? Sorry, but unless someone punches the ball off their own line, you won’t see a more clear cut red card all season.
Yet there should be some leeway for refs in ‘last defender’ situations where there is neither shirt-tugging, tripping or anything out of the pages of the ‘Sly Art of Defending’.
Perhaps, in cases like this, there should be a case for just a yellow.
In cases like what? We all – everybody who watches football – bemoan the lack of refereeing consistency, so you really can’t adjust the rules for the sake of a spectacle, that’s an incredibly naive way of approaching this. You suspect, also, that Howard’s opinion might be a little different had Rio Ferdinand been the protagonist rather than Branislav Ivanovic – there’s not even an attempt here to be impartial.
This is the kind of opinion you’d expect on a Chelsea forum, not a national newspaper.
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Mr clattenburg ruined it all. it was supposed to be a nice till he started with his freewill donation of cards to the European champions it hurts to lose an unbeaten run to a rival but hurts more if the officiating was like clattenburgs.
In reply to RedAdiar
I am a Chelsea fan and thank you for your comment and i agree 100 per cent with everything you said .
It was a thrilling game until Clatenburg ruined it .
Having seen the incident occurring almost right in front of me, I’m going to do something I dont normally do, ie comment on a refereeing decision.
The incident occurred so far out, Ashley was not denied a goal-scoring opportunity. It is true he could have gone on to create a goalscoring opportunity, but when the contact was made it was most certainly not an obvious goalscoring opportunity. The contact itself was simply a “coming together”; had it happened in the centre circle, stats indicate that over 75% of the time no foul is given. (Before looking this up, I would have thought almost 100% would not have been considered a foul, but I bow to the statisticians!)
Personally I would have given the foul (and would give the foul in the middle of the park too) as the forward was accidentally hindered. But, accidentally or otherwise, hindered he was and deserved the foul. I saw little justification for a yellow, never mind a red. Mr Clattenburg took the letter of the law too far and totally ignored the spirit of the law.
At this point I should say that I am not a Chelsea fan. I was there to support my team in a difficult game – a game which was effectively ruined for the paying public by the ineptitude of the referee.
Sir Alex is right to state that the sending off changed the game. At that point Chelsea were on top, but that is a meaningless observation. United could have, and possibly would have, weathered the storm. With our attack we can score at any time, and as long as our shaky defence kept Hazard and Mata at bay, we were always in the game. I feel we would have ended strongly as per usual, and possibly taken all three points.
In respect of the Torres sending off, by this point Mr Clattenburg had lost it entirely. I was beginning to wonder if he had taken drugs at half time, because all his decisions were at variance with everyone else in the ground! Possibly a booking for Johnny Evans, but that would have been a little harsh given the nature of the game until then – it was feisty but never boiled over into “dirty”. But to send off Torres was ludicrous, inept and significantly destroyed any credibility the man has as a referee.
As for our winning goal, it was a superb bit of opportunism. An able referee would have seen Chico come back from an offside position; Mr Clattenburg however was as far from an able referee as it is possible to get. Sadly, he was unably assisted by his linesman who should have – but failed – to spot it too. Let’s face it, in that situation, a linesman doesnt really have a lot to do: he could have and should have spotted it. He failed.
Now as a United fan of 30 years I am happy these decisions went for us and we came away from the European Champions with all three points. That’s no mean feat and not many teams (if any) will do that this season.
But as a football fan of more than 30 years years I am very unhappy with the standard of refereeing and the destruction of a perfectly good game of football by Mr Clattenburg. His performance bought the game and the good name of referees into disrepute.
As for the alleged comments – if Mr Clattenburg said those things he should never referee again. However, as referees arent recorded, it’s going to require the honesty, bravery and integrity of the linesmen and fourth official to press any charges. And I think we all know the likelihood of that happening.
Three points gained for United, yes, thats fantastic. But sadly many, many more points dropped for referees and football in general.