NO HOLDING BACK
Referees must step up battle to halt grappling in the box
REFEREES are delivering on the promise to get tough on dissent and disrespect but failing on the main blight on our game — holding and blocking in the penalty area at set-pieces.
I am sure that this will have been the main discussion point at the referees’ select group meeting on Tuesday after Mike Dean’s decision to highlight the issue by awarding two penalties at Stoke versus Manchester City last Saturday.
Most observers, Sportsmail’s Jamie Redknapp in particular, applauded Dean’s bravery and while I felt the second penalty decision was rather harsh on Raheem Sterling I could see why the referee acted so firmly.
Players who show no interest in the ball, but instead turn to face the opposite direction in order to concentrate on blocking an opponent, need to be stopped.
But the law will not work if only one referee is applying it. What we need to see this weekend is the majority of referees picking up the more obvious offences we can see from the stands every week.
The clearest example highlighted from the first two weeks was Swansea’s Leroy Fer pulling the shirt of Burnley defender Michael Keane which referee Jon Moss chose to ignore.
Knowing the referees, however, I do not anticipate this crackdown is going to be applied by all of them so we won’t see the end of this particular aspect of the dark arts any time soon.
Consistency is the key with referees acting against dissent and it has been refreshing to see officials apply the law as they should have been for years. Chelsea’s serial offender, Diego Costa, was cautioned in both Premier League games so far by Anthony Taylor and Moss respectively.
However, the striker escaped what should have been dismissals for second cautionable offences.
That he was allowed to stay on the field against both West Ham and Watford reduced the effect of the excellent cautions for dissent.
Whatever the intention, officials must be consistent so for the clampdown on dissent to be worthwhile players must be sent off if they deserve a second yellow.