Tuesday, March 2, 2010

50-50? No, It Was Not

Okay, over the weekend there is this football game in the English Premier League between Stoke and Arsenal. In the game, Stoke defender Ryan Shawcross broke Arsenal midfielder Aaron Ramsey‘s leg.

Since the incident, there had been a lot of talk defending Shawcross’ tackle. Commentators are saying it was just a 50-50 tackle, Shawcross is a “great lad” who did not mean to break Ramsey’s leg, that Ramsey was just unlucky etc.

What a joke!

What game were these people watching? I saw the game live on television and how in the world is that a 50-50 tackle? Ramsey was always the favorite to the ball and Shawcross was late, very late! It wasn’t even close and at best, I will call it a 70-30 tackle. When I saw Ramsey on the ground, I immediately thought this could be bad. Unfortunately it was and Shawcross got a well-deserved red card.

What I don’t understand is how anyone can defend that tackle. Then I remember people defending Martin Taylor when he broke Eduardo’s leg two years ago. The argument was the same then; 50-50 tackle, a “great lad”, did not mean it etc. It's funny but talk about a broken record!

Back then Martin Taylor got a ban of a few games while Eduardo was out for over a year. This is probably what will happen now. Ryan Shawcross will get a 3 match ban while Aaron Ramsey will be out for months. That is injustice in itself, let’s not compound it by claiming it was just a 50-50 tackle.

It was not!

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