This is a pretty good read. Nick Green got Jesse Marsch to write a guest blog on his 100 Percent Soccer blog. Marsch takes the opportunity to write about diving and how much he despises diving. I'm telling you, Marsch continues to gain points in my book because I despise diving as well.
Anyway, Marsch pretty much tells us who he thinks the two biggest divers in the league are; however, I think Paulinho (aka Nagamura) might disagree with his subsequent comment about Brazilians.
If Diving as Problem is X, then thuggish defenders who are allowed to destroy the beautiful game are X+1000.
ReplyDeleteI agree with Steven.
ReplyDeletePunish the thugs and you'll see a lot of the diving diminish ... and if it doesn't, card them.
If refs are good enough to card thuggish defenders then they are good enough to card divers. But guess what….refs apparently aren't good enough. At least not in high profile matches. We certainly have plenty of videotaped evidence to that effect. So get them some help; but no one will. This has been going on for years but no one really wants to solve it. The powerful teams only care when the decisions go against them and it has been shown that there is a “Jordan Rules “ effect when it comes to the big clubs; so on balance they really don’t want some impartial, objective authority (such as video evidence) ruining their fun.
ReplyDeleteIn 1999 when I saw the Woman’s World Cup for the first time, it suddenly dawned on me these women almost never seemed to dive, something that still holds true. After years of watching people like Rivaldo hold their face as if they had been wacked with a baseball bat in the head, (when the hit was in the leg), it was almost like watching a different game and I’ve been a fan ever since.
anonymous, you apparently never watched Mia Hamm.
ReplyDelete