Joe has to learn insists Dale boss
KEITH Hill insisted he had little option but to withdraw Joe Bunney from the action at Home Park on Saturday.
Bunney was booked for a foul on Graham Carey and while Hill felt there was an element of gamesmanship from the Argyle man, he said Bunney had to work on his game and improve.
The left-back will miss Saturday’s FA Cup tie against Bromley having picked up his fifth booking of the season and Hill hopes it serves as a warning to the youngster.
“Joe has got to learn better than continually making the same mistakes of giving away silly free kicks, and that’s what they are,” said the Dale chief.
“Potentially, he is a super player if he gets the small detail right, but he lunges in too many times and gets himself booked too many times and that leaves me on a knife edge because in the modern game you are probably only one challenge away from a red card.
“Referees have a mandate, there’s no common sense refereeing any more. So I had to take him off and he will miss next week but I thought Kgosi (Ntlhe) came on and did well.
“It had to happen, I couldn’t afford to go down to ten men – it would have been my fault had I let that situation develop, so I had to make the right call.
“But it is frustrating. I thought in the situation where Joe was booked there was a little bit of gamesmanship and the referee has got to be a little bit wiser than he was with some of the challenges that were going on from both sides.
“That’s the one thing missing from referees, the psychology or the kidology, the gamesmanship that players show now – I think they have got to be more wise to it.”