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| | Thursday 18 September, 2008 | | Blog: French farce | |
The 2-2 draw at Lyon has left Fiorentina furious. Giancarlo Rinaldi asks whatever happened to fair play?
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I had hoped that, as I got older, football would lose its power to make me angry. Every so often I think I might have mellowed. Then I go and watch a game like Lyon against Fiorentina in the Champions League.
It looked like a glorious return to the group stages for the Viola after Alberto Gilardino had given them a two-goal lead. They were under pressure on French soil, of course, but were coping with it admirably. Then disaster struck courtesy of the referee and Claude Puel’s players.
After a collision in the penalty box Luciano Zauri was left on the ground clutching his head. Instead of stopping the play, however, the man in black allowed proceedings to continue. This disaster was compounded by the fact that Lyon decided to play on too. With the prone Zauri playing everyone onside it was child’s play for them to pull a goal back.
Now, sometimes such behaviour can be excused if the players are unaware there is a man down. However, Lyon virtually played the ball over the top of the Florentine defender. Everyone was quite clear what was happening and it was well within their power to roll the ball out of play.
You could see that Fabio Grosso was embarrassed by his teammates’ actions in the post-match interview. He mumbled something about it being more common in France for teams to play on unless the referee blew his whistle. Nonetheless, he was more than a little sheepish about offering it as an excuse.
Of course, the Viola were naïve and showed their Champions League inexperience. They should have played to the whistle instead of trying to play an absurdly impossible offside trap. It was a lesson hard learned.
However, the point runs deeper than that. Fiorentina have an initiative called Viola Fair in which they are trying to encourage a sporting attitude from both their team and its fans. That must have been tested to breaking point on Wednesday night. And, on the evidence of this latest match anyway, there is no likelihood of a Lyon Fair initiative being launched any time soon.
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I’m not the biggest Fiorentina supporter, but Lyon’s play was downright shameless on Wednesday evening. To compound matters, Zauri’s was a serious injury. It shocks and appals me that this goal stands. Fiorentina were in the driver’s seat, and may have won more convincingly than 2-1 had they not conceded under such controversial circumstances. UEFA can never be relied upon to take a stance on anything worthy.
Matthew Langione
While you might accuse the French team of unsporting behaviour, the real blame for this situation lies with the ref. It should be his decision whether to stop play or let it continue. He cannot see everything, but he has two assistants who can alert him to someone lying injured and if they do he can stop the game in progress.
If you kick the ball out automatically, this raises a number of questions. There are those who will always take advantage of such a situation and they are never taken to task for doing so or penalised. So, effectively cheating is rewarded. You see the situation in numerous matches with teams in good attacking positions. An opposition player goes down for little or nothing and the attacking team puts the ball out. The opposition player makes a remarkable recovery and the attacking team gets the possession back in a harmless position. Where is the justice in that?
In addition there is a clear double standard here. There are players who will deliberately kick an opponent to put him out the game and then they will ask for the ball to be put out so their opponent will receive treatment, as if it were an accident. Presumably in the hope that the ref will be fooled into thinking this too. In Italy, many see nothing wrong with the behaviour of players in both of the above situations. Oh they are being clever! Is cheating not unsporting behaviour then?
Brian La Piazza
I agree with the fact that this shouldn't happen in football. But I have to say it's childish to expect anything else in today's selfish money-football. And then again, why should Lyon players even be aware of Viola Fair? And we are well aware that almost every team in Italy uses faking injuries as a method for stopping counter-attacks or threatening situations after corners etc.
It's in the rules that a referee stops the play when a player needs immediate care for a head injury or such, like in this case. For minor injuries there is no reason to stop the opponent's attack. It would be nice to have fair play in every way, but at the moment there sadly is only a handful of teams doing that. It's ridiculous to start blaming a team from a different country. I'm sure most teams in Italy don't know which teams from abroad are emphasizing fair play.
Vesa, Finland
I agree with what you say in your article but you are missing the bigger problem at hand. Soccer is the only major sport in the world in which a player is rewarded for over embellishing an injury. While I am not saying that this is the case in this instance, I am saying that 95 per cent of the time it is true.
If we are talking about unsportsmanlike conduct in the game let’s not look past what we see each and every weekend. The dives and acting that surround the game are the most infuriating part of my favourite sport. I think the sport needs some serious rule changes.
First, and foremost I think the game should go to two 30 minute timed halves. Also, teams should stop kicking the ball out for an 'injury'. If players were no longer rewarded for such acts (by not being able to run down time on the clock or stop play) we would see a major decline in such acts. If we are going to attack the problem of unsportsmanlike conduct let us attack it in the most problematic areas.
Joseph Palazzo, Toronto
This is not fair play. Shame on the French players!
Mikkel, Denmark
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