The Ferguson-Wenger relationship has changed and mellowed as the years have gone by, with our manager seeming to chill out and Wenger’s team not posing the same threat to our Premiership title. They’ve even appeared to be friends at times.
Before we won the title, Wenger was pull of praise for us and conceded there was no shame in saying we were the best team.
Likewise, our feelings have generally softened towards Arsenal too. I’ll never like them and the arrogance from their fans is irritating (particularly now they don’t have the trophies to support their arrogance) but they just don’t evoke the same passion and hatred anymore.
But in case you were starting to worry, unnerved by the mellowed feelings about Arsenal, then be grateful to Arsene Wenger today, who has reminded us exactly why we’ve loved to hate them for so long.
Following Eduardo’s dive last night, the Scottish FA chief is ridiculously asking for a ban to be handed out. Whilst I certainly agree the only way for us to stop players behaving like Eduardo did last night is to hand out bans, that needs to be a decision UEFA make across the board, not just when a club kicks up a big fuss.
“We are reviewing the match to see whether a disciplinary investigation should be launched,” said a UEFA spokesperson. Well, if he is banned then I would like to think the precedence has been set for all diving in Europe, not just for English clubs. I don’t watch a lot of Spanish football but when I do it is clear their league is totally riddled with cheats. Will Real Madrid and Barcelona players be banned too? Or will it just be United, Arsenal, Chelsea and Liverpool players? The bias against English clubs from UEFA is all too apparent.
Regardless, diving is shit and any football fan should hate it, whether it’s their own player who is guilty of it or not. We should welcome anything UEFA decide to do to stamp it out, as long as it is applied to all clubs, not just the ever unpopular English. This is a viewpoint Eduardo’s boss has previously supported.
“We have to fight it and there is only one way to punish people diving obviously: suspension,” Wenger said in 2006. “Once it is in the game it is difficult to get it out. Once a guy knows he might be punished he will not dive.”
Here, here, Arsene!
But he continues: “Sometimes the players dive just because they pushed the ball too far and the only way to get something out of the situation is to dive. We are all managers who can never say that one of our players has not dived. Nobody can say that in our league. I can say that when my team are not involved I am 100% against it.” But when your team are involved it is OK? When it’s your player who has pushed the ball too far and dives, as Eduardo did last night, you’re not 100% opposed?
Despite it being painfully obvious that Eduardo dived last night, Wenger reckons that his player didn’t intentionally do anything wrong.
“I believe it was not a penalty but I’m not sure the keeper didn’t touch him with his right knee,” he claimed. “Eduardo might have jumped out of the way as well. I have never asked anyone to dive to win a penalty. I do not want a penalty which is not a penalty but I do not go as far as to say Eduardo dived.”
But then this is a manager who recently admitted he lies about incidents when he can’t explain what they’ve done, after being asked whether he denies seeing things.
“Yes, because you are thinking, ‘Why has he done that?’ and you know you cannot explain it. At times I saw it and I said that I didn’t to protect the player, because I could not find any rational explanation to defend him.”
With all this negative publicity, hopefully whoever is refereeing on Saturday will have a hard time awarding Arsenal any penalties at Old Trafford.
Man Utd News 24/7
Every ref has a hard time awarding the opposition team at Old Trafford a penalty!
No managers openly criticise their players, but those Wenger comments are the closest he’ll come to condemning the actions of one of his own players.
I was disappointed to see Eduardo dive. Personally I would like to see retrospective punishment on such incidents.
I also hope you aren’t basing your judgements on Arsenal fans on the majority of internet supporters, the majority of whom appear to be from Africa and have never seen Arsenal play, but yet insist on posting uninformed, idiotic comments all over the web.
Hopefully the referee will not disallow goals, it happened to Tottenham a few years back. I’m sure you hope you’ll get your typical Manyoo loving ref who gives you the 50/50s, esp. @ OT but we’re facing you in high spirits and good form…. and we’re gonna run you ragged so be ready! 2-1 to the Arsenal!
My God if UEFA do take action this is going to open up a real hornets nest!!
your article didnt start off too bad.
we all think diving is bad for the game, and none of want to see it at our own club.
i rmember bobby pires coming in to alot of greif with the clock end some years ago when it was getting out of hand.
i was at the game last night, and in real time, yes, it looked like a pen, but when i got home you see he let himself fall. Something Saint Gerrard does on a regular basis (wonder when his retrospective ban will come).
to give eduardo a 2 match ban for this is ridiculous. The guy that broke his leg in 2 only got 3 games!!
the end of the article about wenger seeing things and not seeing things.
there isnt a football fan worth his salt that thinks wenger is telling the truth in post match interviews. OF COURSE HES SEEN IT, he just choses to talk to the player one to one and not air dirty laundry in public.
Fair play, a very balanced viewpoint. However, you can hardly expect Wenger to condemn his own player. Any manager in his position would have reacted the same.
“Is it acceptable? I have never asked in my life any guy to dive to win a penalty, but sometimes players go down because there is no other way to escape the goalkeeper’s tackle, sometimes they dive. We got a penalty against us two years ago in the Quarter-Final of the Champions League that made the difference when Babel dived. Nobody ever apologised to us, it was a blatant dive and nobody spoke about it.”
You do make some valid points in your article, but it really does smack of double standards.
Theres no denying the dive and it was certainly not a penalty. Its strange too, in that Eduardo didnt need to dive, we really had the tie all but in the bag. I think it would be nice to erradicate this from the game completely, but realistically thats impossible.
That said, coming from a Man U fan, its a tough one to swallow. Rooney, RVN etc. have won pens against us by diving, pens which Alex F condemned no more than Arsene did last night.
In every team, diving is sadly rampant. Liverpool have won so many dodgy pens its actually laughable, notleast the Babel dive which actually knocked us out of the CL.
I only wish every other dive brought this much media attention – remember Gerrards in the CL final? Surely that was a far more important match, but it was all glossed over nicely, and we heard little of it after.
My point is this – we all hate diving, but its in every team, some more than others. Nobody has the right to take the moral high ground on this one.
Heres to what should be a great game at the weekend, may the best team win!
@smudger.thank god it was eduardo.had it been ronny last year the calls would have been to hang him.@finestcuts..2008 fa cup.gallas shamelessly kicking out at nani and nt getting sent off or no action being taken later.adebayor using his hand despite being only a yard away frm goal to scre last year.do u need any more examples?what biased refreeing are u talking about.as for sat let us see. u ran us ragged last year but we won 2 1 still
I don’t read this site often enough to know all the background here, but as long as you’re crusading against divers all across Europe, I wonder…
Did you continually admit that Ronaldo was a diver and condemn it then — or does his “justice” only begin now that he’s in Madrid?
Eduardo, on the other hand, has never been accused of it before and always has been considered a class act with both club and country. Someone with no history of diving — and honestly, no real panic about losing the tie against Celtic — surely has earned the benefit of the doubt.
Players going full speed are GOING to be off balance. There really is such a thing as a player going down in the box without it being either a penalty OR a dive.
Final thought: Whenever a keeper dives straight sideways as Boruc did, it’s almost always going to look like a pen. If nothing else, even if there’s no foul, the offensive player knows he’ll have to jump. How many guys can do that — with the ball bounding around somewhere — and land upright?
I am an Arsenal fan and I’ll be the first to say that when Boruc sprawled out, I thought it was a penalty. On the replays, clearly Boruc made incidental contact if any at all. No penalty. But I’ve also watched Eduardo for Arsenal and Croatia, and NEVER seen him try to con his way to a PK. It shouldn’t have been a penalty, but my guess is that Eduardo was off balance and simply went down. Side note: Eduardo is clever enough in the box that he is fouled, tugged, grabbed and so forth in game after game — and never complains.
Bottom line on the Celtic incident: No penalty, no card, no nothing.
Arsen Arsen Arsen!
I am supprised he has not came out with his famous line “i zaw nahfink!
He knows the player dived!
Lets face it or not Diving to an extent is part of the game and if any manager says otherwise it is because he is being politicaly correct!
Why is diving part of the game?
Well i will use this as an example, I can remember a match where Wayne Rooney burst into the box and was man handled by the opposing player. He struggled to stay on his feet.. He flicked a shot wide of goal whilst falling to the ground with the defender falling ontop of him! The result was no goal & no penalty!!
If you beleive that any manager in the Premier League has not said these words then you are a fool ” if you get any contact in the box then go down.
Maybe im wrong??? AM I?
We are Africans who do not have the previladge of watching Arsenal play, but are fully committed as loyal fans of this beautifull game. We go out of our way to purchase expensive multychoice decoders to watch Arsenal play cause they play the most attractive football in the world. Smudger who ever you are relate your comments to the beautifull game and do away with racist comments.
All the best this weekend at Old Traford against Man United, go watch the game live and tell us about the atmosphere and be Arsenalistic this time.
Your completely right trevor. Sometimes you hear the old ‘he was a bit too honest there’ comments from pundits. This is why I find the Eduardo uproar so strange. Definite dive, shouldn’t have done it, but the reaction to it is out of proportion.
Ah you are just hoping that this gives your defenders license to bring down our players in the penalty box, eh ?
you kidding me it was not a dive is he blind or what
Good points, Scott the Red.
I’m an Arsenal fan and I hate diving, I would be happy to see Eduardo (however out of character his cheating was last night) banned for two games. I would like to see that for ALL divers, it spoils the game for me and I did not cheer when the penalty went in.
Interesting point that you think Arsenal fans are arrogant. That’s what I think about Man United, Spurs and (especially) Chelsea fans. Most supporters crow about success and provoke their biggest rivals over their failures. The sh*t is always browner from the other side it seems.
Hoping for a fast, entertaining, fair and exciting game on Saturday. May the best team win – but if we play rubbish and win anyway that’s OK.
i hope they dont start banning people for diving!
it will just give them another reason to ban our players,
they look into every detail that happens with regard to manutd.
we’d end up with players banned when they didnt even dive!
A Dive pure and simple .
I havenever seen an attack like this. To be honest he was touched. Even if it was a dive, the post game conference was all about it, and nothing about the arsenal team winin the mathc.
Many players dive. Eduardo seemed to get slight contact and bought the penalty. He knew the keepr was coming but he did not know the keeper would try to pull out, so Eduardo was in the motion but still got slight contact.
It seems like there is more than just whatas on the surface, probably becasuse Arsenal had a seemingly perfect image. but to be hoinest, which ever fan you are , its been taken out of proportion.
aig – Arsenal beat us 2-1 last season!
Kings – Alright mate.
King – Sorry I thought you were someone else. Whilst I am on though how can you possibly say you have never seen such a fuss over a dive? Have you never watched motd or read the papers after Ronaldo allegedly used to dive. Collymore wanted him hanged for his “dive” against Bolton last season. It was infact a fair challenge by J Lloyd Samuel. Ronnie didn’t even dive just went to ground and a penalty was awarded. Oh the uproar!
I remember that,King Eric.I didn’t know about the dogger wanting him hanged because I am not English,so no English media for me.That was one of the times where Ronnie didn’t even appeal but the ref still gave a penalty.
Anyway we scored another one a while later,a stunning goal that was.