There is probably no manager in the top echelon of football, who criticises referees more than Bolton's Sam Allardyce and usually because his team hasn't won. Now he is involved in another controversy, because a referee's decision went his way.
Whilst most people felt that Bolton's El-Hadji Diouf had dived in the match against Blackburn, Allardyce shook his hand when he left the field and then went on television to defend him. 'Everyone dives,' said Allardyce, 'and they always have done'.
I'm not sure that everyone does it but it is true that diving has been around for a long time. I remember Maurice Edelston, to my mind the best player ever to play for Reading, used to fall over in the penalty area if he lost the ball. Maurice, who became a teacher at Blue Coat
School, was an intelligent man and when asked why he did it, would answer, 'It was worth a try'. And that was it really. It was worth a try, if you got a penalty all well and good but if not, nothing was lost.
However it became so prevalent in the 1990s that in 1999, the International Board inserted a clause in the Laws, which read, 'Any simulating action, anywhere on the field, which is intended to deceive the referee, must be sanctioned (why don't they say punished) as unsporting behaviour'. This means a caution and a yellow card.
Suddenly there was something to lose but obviously not enough, for two years later FIFA organised a high profile publicity campaign and referees were instructed to take strong action against simulation. But, as we can see all too frequently, this did little to dampen player's enthusiasm for diving. They may get a yellow card but it's a chance worth taking, because on the other hand they may get a penalty, which in the Bolton/Blackburn game won the match.
Now the Professional Footballers' Association, whose job it is to defend players, has decided it's time to warn those in the professional game, that it is their duty not to feign injury or exaggerate tackles, particularly if there has been minimal contact or in some case no contact at all, to try and get a fellow member cautioned or to deceive the referee into awarding a penalty. They are apparently designing a new poster to make players aware that the PFA condemns this type of behaviour.
I wonder if the PFAs action is prompted by the rising campaign for simulation to be upgraded to a red card offence, at the same time as they are negotiating for the suspension of players after receiving five yellow cards to be extended to six. This means of course that a caution won't even have the same deterrent it has had up till now.
Their given reason however, is that 'We must appreciate that referees are human and it is not fair for the players to expect them to make split-second adjudications about diving'. I would certainly go along with that. It may look easy on television, particularly after the fifth camera angle but out there on the field of play, it is anything but, especially with the speed the game is played today. Even if a player is not caught by an opponent, he may not have dived. He may have tripped over his own feet, or the ball, he may have stumbled, particularly after overstretching.
And don't forget there has to be intent to deceive the referee, for it to be penalised. If simulation became a sending off offence, there would be even greater pressure on the referee.
For managers like Sam Allardyce, every point is vital and while they accept diving as just one of those things, we can only wonder whether an appeal from the player's own union, will have any more effect than the FIFA publicity campaign.
Dick
Sawdon Smith