Official Premiership 2008/09 thread

[HailtotheYo]

van Persie is showing his awesomeness for the first time in... forever.

yes, yes he did and it was magnificant ! Fuck yes !

Nobody circles the wagons like the Arsenal Gunners

[Clawson]

So I see that newfound money is doing Man City and QPR a whole lot of good

Yeah I mean, having all that money for one day in the transfer window would sure make us an instant winner.

[HailtotheYo]

Sarcasm - look it up

[Hobo]

I'm glad I'm going to the game against West Ham tomorrow. Since avoiding defeat will send us top!

[Anderson]

Back on the Ronaldo thing. I'm so confused, there's no way that he would do that without hearing a whistle, I'm not saying that there was a whistle or that he shouldn't have been sent off but he must have heard something otherwise he may aswell have just headed it in.

[Matt]

Because players usually decide to smash the ball to the floor with their palms when they do hear a whistle anyway. Not to mention the only sound was an airhorn. And when the whistle was blown, he first tried to say that he was pushed.

[TheArsenal]

Hooray for Arsenal!!

And what is it with refs not wanting to send John Terry off this season?

[Clawson]

Because players usually decide to smash the ball to the floor with their palms when they do hear a whistle anyway. Not to mention the only sound was an airhorn. And when the whistle was blown, he first tried to say that he was pushed.

And yet, watch the FA let him off because "he heard a whistle thus it wasn't fair to him, this decision of course has nothing to do with him playing for United. And nothing to do with us being scare of Ferguson. I mean it's completely logical why we decide to only enanct Fergie's suspension after a derby game."

[Anderson]

Because players usually decide to smash the ball to the floor with their palms when they do hear a whistle anyway. Not to mention the only sound was an airhorn. And when the whistle was blown, he first tried to say that he was pushed.

And yet, watch the FA let him off because "he heard a whistle thus it wasn't fair to him, this decision of course has nothing to do with him playing for United. And nothing to do with us being scare of Ferguson. I mean it's completely logical why we decide to only enanct Fergie's suspension after a derby game."

Ronaldo's banned for one game. He can't appeal because it's two yellows. And yeah Terry should have gone for the two footed tackle on Sagna. So should Ivanovic for his 46 different fouls in the second half

[stokeriño]

I'm predicting now that Arsenal will beat Chelsea at the weekend.

It just seems to fit. "Oh noes, our squad is imploding...so let's go to Stamford Bridge and take all 3 points".

[Anderson]

Now watch Arsenal lose at home to Wigan next week

[Baddar]

I'm predicting now that Arsenal will beat Chelsea at the weekend.

It just seems to fit. "Oh noes, our squad is imploding...so let's go to Stamford Bridge and take all 3 points".

Such a perfect day.

*Cue links provided to the song*

It really couldn't have gone much better. Huge upsides and the two downsides were Evra getting his 5th yellow of the season, and Ronaldo picking up a stupid red card. I know Evra misses the Spurs game on the 13th Dec due to 5th yellows not kicking in for 7 days (we play Sunderland in 6) but does that apply to two yellows and a red as well?

I wouldn't mind not having Ronaldo on Wednesday and then Saturday, as we should cope against Blackburn and Sunderland at home, but if it's the same situation as Evra, Ronaldo will miss the Spurs and Stoke games, both away from home. >_<

[Farmer Reil]

Having just watched MOTD2, the Joe Hart thing was immense. The Ronaldo thing was hilarious (although the first yellow was very debatable).

Also, the commentator for Blackburn/Portsmouth is TERRIBLE. Like, worse than Caroline Cheese.

Is Gomes actually a goalkeeper? He reminds me of the paddle from Pong. He never, ever, actually catches or secures the ball in any way, he just sort of gets himself in the way so it doesn't go in the net.

Sometimes.

Edited November 30, 2008 by Farmer Reil

[Zaz]

Bale has just come on for Spurs, making his 18th appearance for us and apparantly we haven't won a single game that he's played in. Crazy stuff.

League games. He's played in winning cup games for us before.

[therockbox]

Because players usually decide to smash the ball to the floor with their palms when they do hear a whistle anyway. Not to mention the only sound was an airhorn. And when the whistle was blown, he first tried to say that he was pushed.

And yet, watch the FA let him off because "he heard a whistle thus it wasn't fair to him, this decision of course has nothing to do with him playing for United. And nothing to do with us being scare of Ferguson. I mean it's completely logical why we decide to only enanct Fergie's suspension after a derby game."

Ronaldo's banned for one game.

He'll get another game for refusing to leave the field. At least he should, anyway.

[Baddar]

He didn't refuse to leave the field at all.

Ok, he walked off slow, but that was more to do with the fact that he seemed bemused as to why he was being sent off, the silly bastard.

And as for the FA being scared of Ferguson, that couldn't be further from the truth. He's always picking up bans and fines for comments he makes. Some of them are worthy, yes, but others are just the FA being petty.

[therockbox]

He was arguing with the referee about the decision after being shown the red card. He should've left the pitch straight away.

Any how long is Wayne Rooney going to get away with abusing refs for? Every time you see him without the ball he's screaming at the ref.

[Baddar]

The reason Ronaldo didn't leave the pitch straight away was because he was genuinely confused as to why he was sent off. It's clear that he could've easily headed the ball (and possibly scored) if he didn't hear something, so I don't believe for one second that he was trying to gain an advantage by handling it.

As for Rooney, he does scream at the ref a lot, but the same can be said for tens of others in the PL, so it's not just him.

EDIT: Players will only stop shouting at referees when they get something back from this Respect campaign. At the moment it's very much "Respect us, you fuckers, despite the fact we'll still get huge decisions wrong all the time."

Edited December 1, 2008 by Badd-um-tsch

[Scott McFly]

Refs are only human and they try their best to make the right call. Screaming at them for every decision they make isn't going to help things. You never see people in Rugby abusing the ref all the time, so why should football refs have to put up with it? If anything refs are having to be very restrained with dishing out the yellow cards for dissent because if they did start giving them out then you'd see about 4 people left on the pitch. The FA should give a few weeks notice to say they will be clamping down hard on shouting at the ref and then once they start showing yellows for it you'll see players quickly learn to shut the fuck up.

[Baddar]

I still stand by what I've already said before...

Yes, they're human, so they're allowed to make mistakes. But also, they should be forced to admit to them and apologise for them. Managers get punished A LOT for comments made about referees, and all to often it's because of poor decisions (See Scolari yesterday) so I just think making ref's talk about the game and giving reasons to the public would definitely help things. Managers are forced to talk about the game, and I assume players are too, so referees/assistants should also be obliged to do it, since they're a part of the game as well.