Wigan’s Steve Bruce struggles to ‘Respect’ the FA

The FA’s respect campaign hit another major problem this weekend when Wigan’s Emmerson Boyce was sent-off at Newcastle for two yellow cards.

Mistake

There was little argument about the first, but the second was a mistake by referee Andre Mariner as Boyce quite clearly got the ball and not the man.

Wigan boss Steve Bruce was rightly angry about the decision as Wigan had been leading at the time and ended up only just scraping a draw. He spoke out about the decision but stayed within the realms of the Respect agenda.

Bureaucratic rules

Now, however, Bruce has been left completely frustrated by the ridiculous bureaucratic rules that govern our game.

Television replays showed the second booking to be a mistake and referee Mariner subsequently admitted his error and said it was a fair tackle and Boyce should have stayed on the field of play.

Fifa regulations

Despite this, unbelievably, the laws of the game do not allow the booking to be rescinded. The Football Association used to allow red and yellow cards to be downgraded or upgraded, but after the 2005-06 season they moved to be closer to the Fifa regulations.

Now, the FA does not allow bookings to be challenged under any circumstances, while they will only overturn red cards if there has been a “serious and obvious mistake”.

One match ban

So, we have a situation whereby everyone in the world knows that Boyce should not have been sent off yet next week he will have to serve a one match ban. What exactly is serving that ban for?

Steve Bruce spoke for us all when he said,

“I admire Andre for admitting his error but what good does it do us? The rules are ridiculous. Referees have a really difficult job and it’s far too often that we are talking about them after games. When Emmerson was sent off we were comfortably in the lead and I honestly believe that we would have gone on to win the game. But instead we have to play the last thirty-five minutes with ten men and now Boycey will also miss next week’s game against Everton. The biggest problem, and what I find most frustrating, is that we have no right to appeal.”

The Wigan boss went on to reopen the debate about the use of technology to assist the referees. He feels that enough is enough and the time is right for change.

“In the time it took for Boycey to be sent off a fourth official or someone in the stands could have watched the replay from different angles and a judgment made from there and relayed to the referee. I don’t believe this takes any authority away from the referee – on the contrary, it empowers him to be confident that the correct decision has been made. Obviously I am only talking about major decisions: penalties, balls crossing the goal line and sending offs.”

I’m not sure that I agree totally with Brucie about the use of technology. I can see both sides of the argument but my main concern is if you can use technology to help with penalties, goals and sendings-off, why shouldn’t you use it for free-kicks, offsides, corners or goal-kicks, throw-ins, etc, etc?

You would have the additional problem of working out how to restart the game if it is stopped for a referral. You also have the major issue for me that the game at the top must be the same game that is played at grassroots level. The fact that everyone can play the exact same game that is played by the top stars is what makes football the most popular game in the world.

Once you add technology to the Premier League game it becomes a different game to the one played in local parks on a Sunday morning. That can’t be allowed to happen.

Defy logic

This case with Boyce is different as it was televised and we can clearly see that he was the victim of a miscarriage of justice. He was punished by being sent-off and his team were punished by having to play for a significant time with ten men. To punish the player and the club again for something that has been proven not to happen seems to defy any logic that I can attempt to apply to the situation.

The FA demands respect yet it makes rules that fly in the face of common sense. Steve Bruce can respect Andre Mariner because he made an honest mistake and has admitted it and apologised for it. Can anyone explain to me how he is meant to respect the FA?