Monday 14 March 2011

Avram Grant to face FA charge?



Well Avram seems to be losing his patience with the idiots with the whistle at long last. Up until now, he has bitten his tongue and exercised discretion, despite the folly of blundering officials. But after the rank display of Mr Jones yesterday, Avram has cracked.

True Avram stopped short of calling Jones a cheat, but he suggests that the referee was a homer in the second half, intent on making up for his error in the first half. Admittedly Avram uses the word "maybe" but he doesn't pull any other punches when he says,  "Maybe this [Piquionne's goal] is the reason the referee started the second half very, very strange. Until they scored the goal, he gave fouls and penalties, everything for them."

And Grant was equally as blunt when it came to the failure to award Tomkins a penalty after he was wrestled to the ground by Walters, saying, “It was a penalty for us at the end and he didn’t give it. Maybe he felt a little bit weak.”

Ferguson is on an FA charge for his outburst following the game at Chelsea and Grant is in similar territory with his comments. He is spot on of course, but the FA don't want managers to be honest when they talk to the press do they?

Will Grant receive an invitation to explain his comments? If so, he should go along with a recording of the game and ask the powers to be to explain why Etherington was awarded a penalty when he wasn't touched and why Tomkins wasn't when he was clearly thrown to the ground. An explanation from the FA and Mr Jones might just be appropriate in the circumstances!

Hang on. Mr Jones? Is that really his name? Or has Clattenbung The Homer assumed an alias?

13 comments:

Anonymous said...

since whave have referee's been perfect?

they are human, they a prone to error much like you and I.

although I doubt whether you would ever admit where you have been wrong!

Hammersfan said...

Oh dear God! As it happens, I do admit when I am wrong but that's not the issue.

Did you READ the article. It's what Grant SAID! Yes I agree with Grant but GRANT said it!

Yes referees do make mistakes but referees should not try to correct mistakes by favouring a team subsequently, and that seems to be what happened.

Did Pulis speak to the referee at half time? Was the referee told he missed the handball? If he went out with the intention of "balancing things up", then he was cheating in the second half. If that was the case, then he should be stood down. Mistakes are one thing, deliberate "mistakes" are a completely different kettle of fish!

Lord Canning said...

I wonder what it was that Matt Etherington was talking to the referee about before they kicked off for the second half. ?? Something like this ?:
'' Hey Mike, I got a couple of grand with BetSure @ tens for a penalty within 3 minutes -I can cut you in for 50%. What d'ya say??''
''Sure thing Matt, I need to give your lot a goal and to get paid a few grand in the process will cover me in case I'm kicked off the prem list for a couple of weeks.
Good luck in the semi's ''

Naaaa - couldn't happen!

Anonymous said...

Spot on. Although I don't think we played as well as we can, I do believe you are correct that the referee cost us. I think it was two things, he was trying to correct the decision from the first half and he was intimidated by the Stoke support. At least we can concentrate on survival, and beating Spurs on Saturday :) COYI

Hammersfan said...

Might not be too wide off the mark there. Unless Pulis went into the officials' dressing room and asked them if they wanted to get out of Stoke alive. TV on in the ref's dressing room perhaps, showing the Piquionne handball?

penyabogarde said...

up the hammers!

from premiĆ  de mar (barcelona)

next week TOTTEMHAM 1, WEST HAM 3
(Goals: Ba -2- and Walker)

Hammersfan said...

Walker? Who the hell is Walker?

Deane said...

The look on Pulis's face at half time gives the impression he was definitely going to have a word with the ref and maybe show him his dvd of all the decisions that have gone against them
I'm not sure it was handball so could have gone either way (wolves anyone) but Upson was targeted and deliberately fouled to allow Huth a clear header for the first goal and for the second our man on the end of the wall was pulled away and over to allow the shot through the gap created
I'm human and prone to error but if I made 4 wrong calls in 90mins at work I'd be looking for another job
It's time the FA got tough with referees and referees got tough on the pitch dissent=yellow card that'll go a long way to stopping intimidation and also take a lot of pressure off referees
ps Walker is the stoke player that fouled Upson to allow Huth a free header

Hammersfan said...

How is he going to score for us against Spurs Deane? (See the comment from our Catalan friend above!). Good to have you back. Did your internet go down again?

Stani Army said...

Kyle Walker? Spurs o.g? But he's on loan at Villa. Maybe Walker is Spanish for something else...

Hammersfan said...

Maybe it's a typo, perhaps there should be an n instead of the l. So, on that basis, Boa must be coming on as a late sub!

Anonymous said...

The referee was an utter disgrace.

Looking forward to the Spurs game, we play better against football teams.

Anonymous said...

Stoke player is called Walters, not Walker.

Jack