Nerve Endings Firing Away

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Luis Suarez will sleep well tonight and he shouldn’t. The best bit of acting today was by Suarez with his “Who me?” expression when the referee showed him the red card for thinking he was playing volleyball at the end of extra time. I believe that this was probably the most flagrantly deliberate handball I ve ever seen.

I agree and disagree with Dave Brockington here: yes, Suarez did cheat and he got caught (he wouldn’t have been sent off otherwise) and yes they should change the rule under those circumstances, the referee should be allowed to consider that a goal. I think that they should go even further: allow the goal, send the man off and give the attacking team a penalty kick. This is the type of behavior that FIFA should want to discourage.

Every time we see someone taking a penalty kick, Mercia always says “Poor goalkeeper!” I always say the pressure is not on the goalkeeper, but on the player(s) taking the penalty(ies). Today’s events have confirmed that for me yet again and I believe that there is absolutely nothing that can persuade me otherwise [source].

An otherwise liberal political blog, Balloon Juice has been hosting brief World Cup tidbits from their guest blogger, Randinho that I prefer to read every day. Admittedly, I’m a FIFA World Cup aficionado more than a football fan since I don’t follow club football much (if Suddenlink offers Fox Soccer Channel, I might be inclined to although ESPN3 is looking good now). This piece of opinion by Randinho perfectly captures my sentiments on the Suarez handball that sent Ghana crashing out of the World Cup.

Sure, Suarez was punished to the extent of the law but the context of his blatant foul meant that apart from missing the next match, his team and country hardly faces any consequences. It is like a cricket umpire giving an LBW and asking the bowler to try again and hit the stumps while the batsman stands aside. Suarez effectively converted a 100% likelihood of a goal into say, 70% likelihood. Given those odds (as long as they are below 100%, they are good), any player would have every reason to swat away sure goals especially for a knockout match in absence of a stricter punishment. I don’t even think you need technology to spot such kind of egregious fouls although I wouldn’t mind an instant replay review.

Without Suarez, Uruguay might lose its next match against Netherlands but in my opinion, they have lost all respect among all football fans. When you see their coach offer excuses like, “The hand of Suarez is the hand of God and the Virgin Mary — that’s how Uruguayans see it”, you know they are clutching at straws and trying desperately to regain lost honor. I was ambivalent about Ghana and Uruguay right up to that moment but now I wish Netherlands, the team I root for, crushes Uruguay just like Germany has been crushing its opponents. However, if Uruguay goes on to win the World Cup, I say FIFA fold away that Fair Play yellow flag that they trot out before every match because it is clearly not working.