Worst tackle ever?

[SWA]

oxf*rd shambles. The FA really are clueless!

[ZacNaloen]

No, they know their rules pretty well. That's why they have their hands tied.

[windermere_royal]

So didn`t the ref deal with John Carver by giving him a red?..if so why is he being charged? pity McManaman didn`t tweet about it because he would really be in the shit.

[barelylubedcock]

Seems clean to me

It clearly shows one foot on the ground, and the ball in a playable position. Reckless and clumsy especially rather than malicious.

I have been away from news, I'm guessing he's not been hammered for it by the FA

[Sanguine]

I remember a tackle by Vincent Kompany earlier this season where his tackling position looked similar to that on the freeze-frame. Kompany got a bit of the ball first, and on here was almost unanimously considered hard done by.

For me the point of a red card in these situations is not to punish the result – Kompany and McManaman made similar tackles, just the latter was fractionally later in the challenge.

And on the current rules – isn’t it an anomaly that the FA will intervene to reverse a red card, when the referee has ‘seen the incident’ but not to retrospectively punish players when the referee has deemed the challenge fair.

[soggy biscuit]

And on the current rules – isn’t it an anomaly that the FA will intervene to reverse a red card, when the referee has ‘seen the incident’ but not to retrospectively punish players when the referee has deemed the challenge fair.

FA say that in 'exceptional circumstances' they will look to amend the referee's decision by imposing a punishment when the referee did nothing or take away a punishment if they feel it was imposed wrongly by the ref. It is not a fixed rule that they don't do something if the ref dealt with it at the time but a guideline they like to work under as they feel it could undermine the ref otherwise.

They deemed this tackle not to be an exceptional circumstance

[TBM]

John Barnes made a (fairly) good point last night, on TalkSport

Something along the lines of where do you draw the line at re-referring games?....do it for this challenge and then it opens it up for say the likes of Stockport v Macclesfield to send in videos of a challenge in one of their games and so on and so on....they will be forever re-referring games for challenges. Different if it was an off the ball incident (elbow/punch/kick etc) but not for a tackle.

[Sanguine]

John Barnes made a (fairly) good point last night, on TalkSport

Something along the lines of where do you draw the line at re-referring games?....do it for this challenge and then it opens it up for say the likes of Stockport v Macclesfield to send in videos of a challenge in one of their games and so on and so on....they will be forever re-referring games for challenges. Different if it was an off the ball incident (elbow/punch/kick etc) but not for a tackle.

They already have rules in place dissuading clubs from making 'frivolous' appeals, a similar rule would do in the case of Barnes' point, surely?

[TBM]

John Barnes made a (fairly) good point last night, on TalkSport

Something along the lines of where do you draw the line at re-referring games?....do it for this challenge and then it opens it up for say the likes of Stockport v Macclesfield to send in videos of a challenge in one of their games and so on and so on....they will be forever re-referring games for challenges. Different if it was an off the ball incident (elbow/punch/kick etc) but not for a tackle.

They already have rules in place dissuading clubs from making 'frivolous' appeals, a similar rule would do in the case of Barnes' point, surely?

Not sure.....you probably see tackles like McManaman did, every week in the lower league but go unpunished. As Dave Whelan said the tackle was not malicious, nor was it reckless....it was simply just a little high (one foot was on the ground, so wasn't even a two footer) and yes would have been a red had the ref seen it but he didn't and you then run the risk of having to check every similar tackle in every league and laying down the same punishment.

[Alexander Litvinenko]

Agreed - the FA will be looking for intent to injure (like the Ben Thatcher incident) rather than just rubbish timing.

[soggy biscuit]

Do think a lot more has been made of this than was needed, but then I guess that is the SSN / Talksport age of sports coverage. Nothing else to talk about so they focus on making something huge so as to cover the minutes easier.

It's a contact sport that is played at a very fast pace, accidents will happen from time to time

[TBM]

Do think a lot more has been made of this than was needed, but then I guess that is the SSN / Talksport age of sports coverage. Nothing else to talk about so they focus on making something huge so as to cover the minutes easier.

It's a contact sport that is played at a very fast pace, accidents will happen from time to time

Thing is, Owen announced his retirement yesterday and hardly anyone was speaking about it - they were more discussing this tackle and the Blackburn sacking.

[soggy biscuit]

True. When they actually had something to talk about they ignored it as the drama trains wheels were in motion over this tackle.

If this incident had happened 15 years ago I feel it would have been highlighted on the MOTD highlights that night then forgotten about. Only reason it carried on being discussed was because nowadays there is something in place (parts of the media) where it is within their interest to keep it being discussed.

Maybe I am as guilty as anyone else there though

[handbags_harris]

Struggling here to understand how anybody can't see the McManaman tackle as anything other than reckless. He's gone in all guns blazing with no thought whatsoever for the safety of his opponent and regardless of whether the ball was there to be won or not (the height of the ball suggests it was winnable but not with the sort of challenge Mcmanaman used) has ended up planting his studs on the leg causing potentially serious injury. So, he's used excessive force, his feet are high, and the studs are up. Reckless, plain and simple, regardless of any other supposedly mitigating circumstances.

[TBM]

Struggling here to understand how anybody can't see the McManaman tackle as anything other than reckless. He's gone in all guns blazing with no thought whatsoever for the safety of his opponent and regardless of whether the ball was there to be won or not (the height of the ball suggests it was winnable but not with the sort of challenge Mcmanaman used) has ended up planting his studs on the leg causing potentially serious injury. So, he's used excessive force, his feet are high, and the studs are up. Reckless, plain and simple, regardless of any other supposedly mitigating circumstances.

Yeah but nobody ever goes into a tackle having thought about it first?.........if you did that, then the opposition would have already gone past you. It was high, it was late but he didn't think "i'm going to injure him in this challenge, i'm going to plant my stud on to his knee cap"

[Alexander Litvinenko]

Struggling here to understand how anybody can't see the McManaman tackle as anything other than reckless. He's gone in all guns blazing with no thought whatsoever for the safety of his opponent and regardless of whether the ball was there to be won or not (the height of the ball suggests it was winnable but not with the sort of challenge Mcmanaman used) has ended up planting his studs on the leg causing potentially serious injury. So, he's used excessive force, his feet are high, and the studs are up. Reckless, plain and simple, regardless of any other supposedly mitigating circumstances.

Reckless yes, but reckless says nothing about intent, which is what the FA will be interested in.

He went for a tackle and got it hopelessly wrong. It happens - sometimes the player's injured, sometimes he's not, sometimes the ref sees it, sometimes he doesn't.

But quite different from a deliberate attempt to injure someone.

[From Despair To Where?]

True. When they actually had something to talk about they ignored it as the drama trains wheels were in motion over this tackle.

If this incident had happened 15 years ago I feel it would have been highlighted on the MOTD highlights that night then forgotten about. Only reason it carried on being discussed was because nowadays there is something in place (parts of the media) where it is within their interest to keep it being discussed.

Maybe I am as guilty as anyone else there though

If the game had happened 25 years ago, it's unlikely it would have even been televised and no one bar the few thousand people who saw it live would have an opinion on it. The analysis is clearly media driven and bad challenges are the issue de jour at the moment. Not condoning what was, IMO a misjudged and reckless attempt to get the ball, but it did somewhat overshadow the far more controvertial blatant handball in the build up to Wigan's winner.

[handbags_harris]

Struggling here to understand how anybody can't see the McManaman tackle as anything other than reckless. He's gone in all guns blazing with no thought whatsoever for the safety of his opponent and regardless of whether the ball was there to be won or not (the height of the ball suggests it was winnable but not with the sort of challenge Mcmanaman used) has ended up planting his studs on the leg causing potentially serious injury. So, he's used excessive force, his feet are high, and the studs are up. Reckless, plain and simple, regardless of any other supposedly mitigating circumstances.

Yeah but nobody ever goes into a tackle having thought about it first?.........if you did that, then the opposition would have already gone past you. It was high, it was late but he didn't think "i'm going to injure him in this challenge, i'm going to plant my stud on to his knee cap"

It's not about deliberately thinking about the challenge you're about to make at all, and I think you know that. Football is as much about instinct as anything else, but no player in the game in this day and age can have an instinct to challenge in this manner now, surely? I'm not saying the planting of the studs on the knee were deliberate, but the level of force used was pre-meditated, a kind of "I'm not backing out of this regardless of the consequences" type challenge. The problem lies with people within the game at all levels, including players and managers, who think it is acceptable to go in as hard as McManaman did when the rulebook clearly states that the use of excessive force is not allowed. McManaman had absolutely no need to go in the way he did, and for me there are absolutely no excuses for his actions. Until that level of force is actively coached out of players then we will have this issue cropping up again and again.

[bcubed]

Struggling here to understand how anybody can't see the McManaman tackle as anything other than reckless. He's gone in all guns blazing with no thought whatsoever for the safety of his opponent and regardless of whether the ball was there to be won or not (the height of the ball suggests it was winnable but not with the sort of challenge Mcmanaman used) has ended up planting his studs on the leg causing potentially serious injury. So, he's used excessive force, his feet are high, and the studs are up. Reckless, plain and simple, regardless of any other supposedly mitigating circumstances.

Yeah but nobody ever goes into a tackle having thought about it first?.........if you did that, then the opposition would have already gone past you. It was high, it was late but he didn't think "i'm going to injure him in this challenge, i'm going to plant my stud on to his knee cap"

It's not about deliberately thinking about the challenge you're about to make at all, and I think you know that. Football is as much about instinct as anything else, but no player in the game in this day and age can have an instinct to challenge in this manner now, surely? I'm not saying the planting of the studs on the knee were deliberate, but the level of force used was pre-meditated, a kind of "I'm not backing out of this regardless of the consequences" type challenge. The problem lies with people within the game at all levels, including players and managers, who think it is acceptable to go in as hard as McManaman did when the rulebook clearly states that the use of excessive force is not allowed. McManaman had absolutely no need to go in the way he did, and for me there are absolutely no excuses for his actions. Until that level of force is actively coached out of players then we will have this issue cropping up again and again.

+1

Well said
I am also struggling to se how this can be seen as anything other reckless. And dangerous, the sort of tackle that should be eliminated from the game

[Alexander Litvinenko]

Has anyone ever said that it's not reckless? It clearly was reckless.

But it wasn't a deliberate attempt to injure, which is what the FA will be interested in looking again at.