Van Dijk’s season is over because of Pickford and the overprotection, cowardice and ignorance of the game’s lawmakers
BACK in October 2007 we witnessed a rare sight at Villa Park.
As Manchester United striker Carlos Tevez rounded Aston Villa’s Scott Carson in the box, the keeper hacked him down and referee Rob Styles pulled out a red card.
There were no complaints, not even from the keeper, as the decision was an easy one. A player had committed a clear red-card offence so, regardless of whether he wears gloves or not, he walks.
Yet, as statistician Bill Edgar has observed, in the 13 years that have followed, no goalkeeper has been sent off in a Premier League match for a dangerous tackle in his own penalty area. Not one. In almost 5,000 games.
Which may partly explain why, in Saturday’s Merseyside derby, neither referee Michael Oliver nor VAR reviewer David Coote paid much attention to Jordan Pickford’s reckless challenge on Virgil van Dijk.
Oliver had a decent view of it and Coote a perfect one, yet the brains of two of the Premier League’s supposedly top referees were telling them it was more important to decide whether Van Dijk’s knee was offside than if dangerous play had knackered it.
The rule has yet to be written that says a goalkeeper has special dispensation to “take no o prisoners” prisonball, when going for the ball, but it seems to have ve lodged in the refereeing g psyche that they should be allowed to charge at opponents with impunity. That aggression is an integral part of a keeper’s ’s mindset. As the cliche he goes, they are wacky guys living on the edge who have to be mad to play there.
It’s an overprotection which probably made Pickford think that even if his uncontrolled lunge took out the Dutchman he’d be given the benefit of the doubt. Which he was.
An angry Gini Wijnaldum (above) made headlines by labelling that challenge “over-the-top and stupid” but this sentence wasn’t dwelt on: “I believe he did not want to injure
Virgil Virgi but he did not care about ab what happened after a the tackle.” That’s the incident in a nutshell. And the reason Pickford, and other keepers, don’t need to care too much is they consistently get away with it. Plus, they know that even if they’re later convicted in trial by TV, no retrospective action can be taken once the ref has seen it and handed out a free pass.
The only surprising thing about that horror challenge is that we haven’t seen more of them. There was certainly no surprise in hearing that down in Stockley Park, Coote didn’t even bother to check if Pickford’s challenge was worthy of action because he thought the offside decision made it irrelevant. An explanation that made more sense than PGMOL boss Mike Riley claiming the challenge had been reviewed but was deemed not to be reckless. Sure. Had it been an unscripted piece of WWE action, wrestling refs would have ruled it so.
Van Dijk’s season isn’t over just because he was hit by England keeper Pickford. He was also hit by a perfect storm of overprotection, cowardice and ignorance from the game’s lawmakers.
Former referee Mark Halsey believes there has been a shocking decline in officiating standards in the Premier League and wants mass changes, claiming a “severe lack of coaching, leadership and direction” is responsible for consistently poor performances. An even bigger scandal is that there is no incentive for referees to improve.
What happens when, like Coote, it becomes clear they’re ignorant of rules they’re paid to implement? They get taken off Premier League duty for just a week and put on the nau g h ty st ep instead of being ordered to re-study the rules and face re-examination. At a time when refs have never been given so much ch help through technolseeing technology, we are seeing a standard that is amateurish h and unacceptable. e.
And everyone ryone who cares about football is paying aying the price.
Pickford doesn’t need to care too much as keepers consistently get away with it