september 23rd
07.39 – And so it rumbles on. The world and his mother have an opinion on what happened at Old Trafford on Sunday.
Arsenal’s actions were ‘indefensible’ according to Andy Gray. “It’s very difficult to have any sympathy for their behaviour at certain moments during the game. It was un-called for and you simply can’t defend the indefensible.”
PFA Chief Gordon Taylor said the incident was ‘not acceptable and has to be addressed.‘ He goes on to say about the players “They’re role models for all the youngsters who play on the local parks, and it’s these high profile players who should set the right standards.”
I assume that comment was meant for all players, and not just Arsenal’s. The FA also released a statement saying “The FA will be looking at various aspects of player behaviour during the match and in the scenes following the final whistle and will make a further statement as soon as this process is complete.”
Arsenal Chairman Peter Hill-Wood said “We were guilty of stupid behaviour. The players concerned were rather silly when you would hope they would show more intelligence. All I can say in our defence is we are not a dirty side and nobody was hurt.”
Kenny Sansom reckons the punishment for Arsenal will be severe. “I think there will be fines for the players involved and points docked – I do think it is that bad.” With all due respect Kenny, that’s bollocks. I think fines are inevitable, certainly for the football club. I think we might see bans for Keown and Lauren, but there was nothing serious enough to warrant docking Arsenal points. I agree, however entertaining it was in the heat of passion at the final whistle, that the Arsenal players shouldn’t have got involved the way they did. However, I understand why they did, and the whole thing has been blown out of all proportion by the media. More crap from James Lawton who laments Arsenal’s behaviour while a ‘bewildered’ Ruud van Nistelrooy was on the receiving end. No question as to why it was van Nistelrooy who was singled out. The reaction to the penalty miss would not have been the same if any other United player had missed it. Arsenal and Ruud have history.
Maybe Arsenal won’t have won any make-new-friends awards, but there are fans of teams up and down the country who will raise a smile at the long awaited exposure of Ruud van Nistelrooy as football’s biggest cheat. A diver, sly kicking/punching, cheat. And it’s not just Arsenal fans who think that. Patrick Vieira accused the Dutchman of stamping on him in the challenge that provoked Vieira’s 2nd yellow card. “if you see what happened he jumped on me and tried to stamp on me. Van Nistelrooy just destroyed the game by reacting the way he did.” The Arsenal captain was eventually led away Roy Keane for who Vieira had some positive words. “There is a big respect between between him and myself. I know him really well as a player. We are both competitive and maybe I would do the same for him.”
And there’s the difference. We’ve all seen Keane and Vieira push each other to the boundaries of fair play over the last 7 seasons. They’ve fought, clashed heads, tackled hard, but there is a mutual respect between them for the way they play the game. There can be no respect for the way van Nistelrooy plays the game. A great striker, but a lousy sportsman. It was noticable that other United players were conspicuously absent when it did kick off a bit at the fnal whistle. When the players got back to the dressing rooms after the game it all kicked off again as van Nistelrooy baited Paddy saying he had ‘no class‘. According to eye-witness reports Vieira had to be restrained and told van Nistelrooy he’d find out what is was like to be really hurt. No doubt that will end up in the FA’s report too.
Yes, some of Arsenal’s players were out of order over this, but as I said yesterday it’s not like it was World War 3. There weren’t any punches thrown, nobody was injured, it was just handbags. Heat of the moment stuff that should be dealt with as such. The FA will investigate the behaviour of the players, I hope they investigate van Nistelrooy and they really have to take a hard look at referee Steve Bennett’s role in this. Without the imaginary last minute penalty, there wouldn’t have been the fireworks at the end, and considering he was ref for the Community Shield, maybe he wasn’t the best choice for this game. As much as the media want to portray it as such, it’s not just Arsenal who are the villains here. Gary Neville threw a punch, nothing has been said of Quinton Fortune’s body-check on Jens Lehmann. It’s too easy to cast Arsenal as the forces of darkness, but then maybe we make it too easy for them.
Cast your mind back to May 8th 2002. Arsenal were on the receiving end of a kicking and punching Man Utd performance. We kept our heads down, played our football, won the game and won the league in their back yard. If every other club watching thinks they can wind us up, provoke us and niggle us to stop us playing football, they will. We have to prove that we can do it without reacting. As hard as it may be, we have to put some faith in the officials to protect us on field and not take the law into our own hands. We have to behave in a way that doesn’t give bitter old hacks like Lawton the chance to highlight our misdemeanours and trot out his xenophobic, holier than thou claptrap while conveniently ignoring our opponents poor behaviour and other circumstances time and time again. It’s a cliché, but we have to let our football do the talking from now on.
We’re going to be under the spotlight for the rest of the season now, like it or not. Starting with this Friday’s game against Newcastle. You reckon Lee Bowyer and Alan Shearer will have a few sly digs to see if they can wind our players up? Of course they will. We need to see a top class Arsenal performance both in footballing and disciplinary terms. The only way to keep them quiet is to give them nothing to write about, apart from football.
Now we just have wait for the FA to deal with this in their usual fair and even-handed manner.
