february 28th
09.30 – Dear The FA,
perhaps you gain some perverse pleasure in charging Arsenal players, and Dennis Bergkamp in particular, at any opportunity. Your latest charge of ‘Improper Conduct’ against Dennis Bergkamp comes 6 weeks after the West Ham game, and is quite frankly ridiculous. The incident itself was trivial. Lee Bowyer, self styled hardman and general oik, ran into Dennis Bergkamp’s hand.
Bowyer then fell to the ground as if he had been hit by space shuttle debris. Not once did Bergkamp look around to see where the player was. He had his arms out to protect the ball, Bowyer ran into him and tried to cheat the referee. I might respectfully suggest you look to stamp out (pun INfuckingTENDED) this kind of gamesmanship from football if you want to be taken seriously. It seems to me the FA has bowed to media pressure and has chosen to believe those people who called it an ‘elbow’. It wasn’t.
If you would like an example of a player using an elbow deliberately, why not take a few moments to look at Newcastle v Leeds from last week and keep a close eye on Alan Shearer? I’ll tell you why not, because he’s an ex-England captain managed by an ex-England manager who you’ve absolved of serious foul play before. How can you charge him now after all the stuff you’ve let him away with? When one referee decided he’d had enough of Shearer’s sly elbows and sent him off for persistant fouling, you relegated him to the Nationwide league. Nice one. What about David Beckham’s elbow on Lee Bowyer? Oooh, sorry, forgot. England captain, golden boy, plays for Man Utd. Rule 1.a – though shalt not charge a Man Utd player with anything (except for Roy Keane, but he’s just a thick, angry Paddy so it’s ok).
Also, I expect that in a few weeks time we’ll see a charge for Ruud van Nistelrooy’s forearm smash on Lauren during the FA Cup game at Old Trafford. But then again, probably not. It seems Arsenal beating Man Utd is punishment enough, as your relcutance to even make a comment about van Nistelrooy’s punch on Freddie Ljugnberg during the title winning game last May quite clearly demonstrates. Despite the fact countless Arsenal fans asked for an explanation for this, you simply ignored them, or sent them a letter or email with some obscure rule from the FA’s ‘make it up as we go along handbook’.
Far be it for me to suggest there is a culture of favouritism and xenophobia within the FA, but the various charges brought against Arsenal players whilst blatantly ignoring other more obvious, and serious, incidents show that this really does appear to be the case. I’m not saying Dennis Bergkamp or any other player is beyond reproach. It would just be nice if you applied the same rules to all teams, or at least made it look as if that was what you were doing.
Anyway, in the interests of Arsenal Football Club, if you could find it in your hearts to provide Dennis with a 3 match ban I would be most grateful. Every season we’ve done the double, Dennis has been suspended for 3 games. You might remember last season you suspended him for 3 games for not stamping on Liverpool’s Jamie Carragher who then got a 3 match ban for throwing a coin into the crowd. It’s easy to see how not stamping on somebody, and behaviour that could incite the crowd, not mention seriously injure somebody, both merit the same ban.
Carry on the good work.
yours sincerely,
arseblogger
ps – you are cunts.
