Search: 'laws'

Respect reaction

On March 18, the FA launched a new strategy entitled “Respect”, designed in part to address bad behaviour at all levels of football. Within 24 hours, Ashley Cole was given only a yellow card for a dangerous tackle in the Spurs v Chelsea match, a punishment strongly disputed by his team‑mates. It had scarcely been mentioned in the immediate aftermath of the game, but Cole’s disrespectful reaction to referee Mike Riley soon assumed prime importance. By the time of Grand Slam Sunday three days later, the new FA chairman Lord Triesman was making personal appeals to Alex Ferguson to “show some respect” towards referees.

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Is the Premier League the Holy Grail or the Emperor without his clothes, asks Gavin Barber

As I recall there have been two distinctively epiphanic moments in my life, on which the significance of an apparently mundane occasion has crept up on me unnoticed before revealing itself in a flash of enlightenment. The first was a few years ago when, at the age of 30, I bought and assembled a garden shed, and suddenly understood that the process of turning into my dad was inexorable and irreversible, and that I should embrace it rather than trying to resist. The second came at Portman Road on February 9, 2008.

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Spectacle takes precedence over players

The broken leg suffered by Eduardo three minutes into Arsenal’s match at Birmingham prompted a swift and furious reaction, with Arsène Wenger’s call for a life ban for Eduardo’s assailant Martin Taylor, which he retracted a few hours later. However, Wenger’s request for analysis of the real problems in the game and concern that “if the newspapers all want to talk about [William] Gallas then Taylor will get away with it” was largely ignored in coverage of the incident.

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The rapid growth of internet sites seemingly beyond the reach of the Premier League’s lawyers is allowing fans the chance to watch their team live online. Martin del Palacio Langer goes surfing

Last May, the Premier League sued YouTube for “having knowingly misappropriated its intellectual property by encouraging footage to be viewed on its site”. The case has not yet been resolved but, as a result of the lawsuit, images of recent matches have disappeared from the site, which now actively tracks and eliminates any videos even remotely related to what is occurring in English stadiums. However, this measure has not meant that football fans around the world have lost their only opportunity of watching the best moments of their favourite matches online. The fall of the popular Google video page gave way to the rise of other sites with even more effective systems, which present highlights online minutes after a game has ended.

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The England Women's Story
by Natalia Sollohub & Catherine Etoe

Tempus, £14.99
Reviewed by Pete Green
From WSC 252 February 2008 

Buy this book

If women’s football still lacks credibility in the minds of many fans and journalists (of both genders), its advocates can also tend to hinder the cause by suspending their critical faculties. “It was a difficult chance,” pleaded a chivalrous Gavin Peacock during the 2007 World Cup, after England’s Eni Aluko screwed horribly wide of an open goal against Japan. As former players, Natalia Sollohub and Catherine Etoe slip easily into a similar cheerleading role – but readers looking for a basic primer on the England team rather than rigorous punditry will find their book a breezily efficient ­introduction.

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