Credit where credits due

Tusky

After seeing the disgraceful drop to the ground from Robben after he was barely touched by Reina, it got me thinking. Football has changed, these days a player will gladly go to ground and take a free kick over staying on their feet and continuing on their run. It wasnt always like this. You can barely touch off a player without them falling to the ground like a tonne of bricks rolling around in agony clutching their ankle.

I started thinking about players who arent like this, I think they deserve some credit! First one that springs to mind is Gerrard. He always seems to try his best to stay on his feet even after nasty fouls. I cant ever remember seeing him dive ( although I could be wrong ) and he always shows good sportsmanship with helping players off the ground etc.

can yea think of more players like this ?

rahim

I'd love to say you're right about Gerard as I think he is one of the best footballers around at the moment, but, I have seen him take a dive at times and, although I can't remember which game at the moment, gaining a penalty by diving.
Also Robben over reacted to what Reina did but then again Reina did raise his hand to another player, and from the position of the ref it probably did look like he struck him. That said, action needs to be taken against players who feel the need to dive cause its ruining the game to some extent.

Big Nelly

Tusky wrote:

can yea think of more players like this ?

Anyone in the Championship to be honest, once players get to the PL most of them turn into little pussies and start falling over all the time. For reference watch the Shef Utd(spit) v Watford game last night. The traitor Eagles was belted in the face but didn't really carry on like Robben did.

Wouldn't mention Gerard because he is usually the one going over the top of the ball and nearly breaking someone's leg.

Kingp35

Tusky wrote:

can yea think of more players like this ?

99% of the players in the Championship. Diving doesnt happen in the Championship, its only the "top" players that have to resort to such low levels.

Hobart

Tusky wrote:

can yea think of more players like this ?

Rooney (as off late anyhow) although he did suffer from a touch of the Klinsmanns when he first joined Manu, he is great for staying of his feet now. I also agree with Gerrard and would add Alonso to that list aswell.

fade2black

Gerrard just strikes me as a pub league player that has made it big. I don't mean that in a negative way with regards his ability but how often do you see players diving and acting like cissies in sunday league football? It's that kind of pub league mentality, an appreciation for the game and what it is, that I like to see.

smemon

gerrard dived against arsenal a couple of years back.

it was in liverpool's half, arsenal were wearing their blue jerseys so it must have been at anfield. vieira and gerrard went in for a ball, vieira shaped as though he was gonna lash gerrard and the ball and gerrard toed the ball ahead and threw himself to the ground, leaving himself look like an idiot.

one of the most blatent dives ive ever seen. what angered me most was that no free kick was given and no booking was given, proving that the ref saw nothing wrong with it!!

gerrard, shearer and all english captains get away with murder in the domestic game.

TheMonster

lol - talk about red tinted glasses.

Google "Gerrard dive" or "Gerrard Diving" - seems to be a lot out there.

iregk

Gerrard i wouldn't mention in there as he is constantly going over the top in tackles and does dive himself on many an occasion.

For me one of the best stay up players altough for some reason refs seem to ignore handballs against him is John Terry. The man is a rock and plays like a man.

KdjaCL

Would bet every player named someone will post rightly that they did X etc:

Jose got it spot on last year "theres no innocents at this level".

Ronaldinho would have half the amount of goals he scores if he didnt dive and try "win" free kicks.

Championship like most lower level would have less of it but still any pro given the chance to win a game by having a little fall will take it.


kdjac

Mark

Gerrard dived for the penalty in the CL Final. Was Roy Keane much of a diver throughout his career?

evad_lhorg

gerrard dived for the penalty against Luton but they missed anyway.

robz150

smemon wrote:

gerrard dived against arsenal a couple of years back.

it was in liverpool's half, arsenal were wearing their blue jerseys so it must have been at anfield. vieira and gerrard went in for a ball, vieira shaped as though he was gonna lash gerrard and the ball and gerrard toed the ball ahead and threw himself to the ground, leaving himself look like an idiot.

one of the most blatent dives ive ever seen. what angered me most was that no free kick was given and no booking was given, proving that the ref saw nothing wrong with it!!

gerrard, shearer and all english captains get away with murder in the domestic game.

If you switch the people around your correct it was Viera in that match with the Blatent Dive:rolleyes:

PHB

I dont remember Keano diving in his career, but i'm sure it happened.
I remember people talking about Ruud diving all the time, and it led to people believing he was some sort of whimp, of course, if he thought he had a chance of scoring, a steam train couldn't knock him down.
Its part and parcel of football atm, simply because FIFA won't put the buck out, and enforce automatic retroactive video punishments for anyone caught diving.
I'm not talking about going down easy, I'm talking about full on diving. If you got a match ban for doing this, the managers would soon cut it out.

p.s.
Diving is a terrible thing in the long run, Ronaldo gets half the frees he should get because he got a reputation as a diver, e.g. against Arsenal last year when he was clrealy taken down by Cole, the ref had a perfect view, and assumed he dived. It doesn't work out in the long run, but still it needs to be stamped out

wheres me jumpa

i think the problem i have with it is i could name a few players here now and next weekend they will go out and dive. might not be in the penalty area, a player might not get sent off over it, but a dive anywhere on the pitch is a dive.

i made the point a few weeks back that defenders are as bad as attackers for it. heinze is a hard fecker but he dives so much. the slightest touch and hes down. a lot of defenders do this. shield the ball, feel the touch in the back and drop. but its clever when a defender does it. its clever when one of the golden boys of english football does it(lampard, gerrard, rooney etc).

ronaldo does it and he is slated and rightly so, he disgusts me at times. but while were looking at players who dont dive, its worth pointing out that the majority of players have dived.

rondeco

PHB wrote:

I dont remember Keano diving in his career, but i'm sure it happened.

usually he had his stoods showing and a lunatic look on his face when he dived!:D

eyerer

a more realistic distinction is those that rarely do it and those that do it all the time

on sunday, sissoko was challenged and went to the ground, i was surprised with how quickly he got up and got on with it
also credit to rooney, i remember a while back he was going forward and there was a number of chances for him to dive but he kept at it and got a shot in

Pigman II

Too many ****ing pussies in the game today but you can't blame them as that is the only way to get an edge nowadays. Have a tight defence and fall around like a bunch of fairies on the edge of the opposition box and you're already 3/4s of the way on the road to success.

Hamaan is one player who deserves credit. He likes to put the foot in but I remember someone (Essien i think?) gave him a nasty foot-up tackle a while back and instead of falling around the ground and pissing his pants he just rubbed it like he had a bee-sting (therer was 3 clear studmarks in his calf at this point btw). I think the reaction probably saved the tackler a red-card tbh.

MrJoeSoap

Scott "The Rock" Parker. His performance(s) against Arsenal said it all.

Tusky

Pigman II wrote:

Too many ****ing pussies in the game today but you can't blame them as that is the only way to get an edge nowadays. Have a tight defence and fall around like a bunch of fairies on the edge of the opposition box and you're already 3/4s of the way on the road to success.

Hamaan is one player who deserves credit. He likes to put the foot in but I remember someone (Essien i think?) gave him a nasty foot-up tackle a while back and instead of falling around the ground and pissing his pants he just rubbed it like he had a bee-sting (therer was 3 clear studmarks in his calf at this point btw). I think the reaction probably saved the tackler a red-card tbh.

Aye, good call. He usually trys to stay on his feet too.

Thanx 4 The Fish

So what league does Andy Johnson play in, I have never seen a player dive as much as him. I wath the reviews of the championship and see as many dive there as I see anywhere else. Jose was correct, there are no innocents.

Was keane not sent off for diving v Blackburn in the 90s ? Also dived v arsenal I seem to recall, cannot remember when it was but remember seeing it.

Pigman II

Thanx 4 The Fish wrote:

So what league does Andy Johnson play in, I have never seen a player dive as much as him. I wath the reviews of the championship and see as many dive there as I see anywhere else. Jose was correct, there are no innocents.

He really has it down to an artform! Not to be confused with taking 10 but didn't he personally EARN about 10 penos last season himself? Ridiculous!

rahim

evad_lhorg wrote:

gerrard dived for the penalty against Luton but they missed anyway.

Thats the one I was thinkin of, also, forgot about him diving in the CL.

therecklessone

From what I've seen of him this year Edgar Davids deserves a mention.

Saved Scott Parker from a yellow in the NYE game at the Lane, both players showed a lot of respect for each other tha day.

Parker's a definite as well.

gimmick

Re Gerrard, he may not dive, but does go down easy in the box, recent examples incluse the penalty he won against Luton, and the penalty in the European Cup Final.

eirebhoy

Everyone goes down easily in the box. Its so rare that someone would stay on their feet in the box with a sliding tackle coming in that I wouldn't even class it a dive. I wouldn't mind an Irish player kicking the ball away from the keeper on the run and tripping over his arm for the peno.

TwistsAndTurns

An interesting quote in one of the papers at the weekend:

Football players spend 90 minutes pretending to be hurt, rugby players spend 80 minutes trying not to get hurt.

The way the game is gone now its gain an advantage at all costs and this has stopped some of the good players from trying to play the game as it should be played. If for example the likes of Robben takes off on a 40 mtr run beating 5 players it look great, but at the end if he looses the ball he looks at the dugout and could be hauled off. The fans are the real loosers in the diving environment.
By the way I saw a linesman at it at the weekend aswell.;)

Thanx 4 The Fish

That was not the quote, the quote was footballers spend 90 minutes pretending to be hurt, Rugby players spend 80 minutes pretending not to be hurt.

You are correct however, there is far too much of it going on and whatever methods there are to stamp it out should be brought in.

Kingp35

Thanx 4 The Fish wrote:

So what league does Andy Johnson play in, I have never seen a player dive as much as him. I wath the reviews of the championship and see as many dive there as I see anywhere else. Jose was correct, there are no innocents.

Totally disgree. I watch the Championship more than the Premiership and it is no where near as bad. You got the odd player who dives but nearly all of them dont. Teh reason teams struggle when they get relegated is because the Championship is a much more Physical league than the Premiership on teams need to adjust to this. There is not even a comparison between the Championship and the PL when it comes to diving. Maybe the season Johnson had in the PL thought him the wonderful art.

Thanx 4 The Fish

Kingp35 wrote:

Totally disgree. I watch the Championship more than the Premiership and it is no where near as bad. You got the odd player who dives but nearly all of them dont. Teh reason teams struggle when they get relegated is because the Championship is a much more Physical league than the Premiership on teams need to adjust to this. There is not even a comparison between the Championship and the PL when it comes to diving. Maybe the season Johnson had in the PL thought him the wonderful art.

Funny, I was just talking to a guy here about how people there use the word thought instead of taught, came up when listening to Cannonball by Damien Rice.

Anyway Johnson was quite adept at diving when he joined the league and is still from what I have seen of him. I have been to see Telford (non league for all of those who do not know), Shrewsbury, Wolves (mates son plays for them) and Tamworth play in recent weeks and I have witnessed diving in each of these games, None moreso than in the Wolves games I have attended, the players are slower in fact so sometimes somebody will purposely slow down to let a player get closer before they dive. I think the reason that some players in the lower divisions go down easy is that they lack confidence in their own abilities and when they are faced with foru or five lads with no support or the chance of getting everyone up on the end of a free, they go for the easier option, now this is not always the case but I feel it often is.

Kingp35

Diving does happen, im not denying that. What im saying is that it happens an awful lot less than it does in the PL. I dont know the reason for that. I suspect that its because there are less foreign players that play in the Championship because I have always felt that foreign players introduced diving to the Premiership with the English lads picking it up from them.

Oh and sorry about my grammar mistake

Pigman II

Kingp35 wrote:

sorry about my grammer mistake

Happens EVERY time.

KdjaCL

People tend to assume diving leads to a peno or red card, a free kick gained by a winger who had noone to cross too is exactly the same. Rather than use the word diving, "winning" a free kick is a better word.

kdjac

Thanx 4 The Fish

KdjaC wrote:

People tend to assume diving leads to a peno or red card, a free kick gained by a winger who had noone to cross too is exactly the same. Rather than use the word diving, "winning" a free kick is a better word.

kdjac

Ever the diplomat

And don't be sorry matey, it just illustrated a point I was making earlier quite well.

Rollo Tamasi

eyerer wrote:

also credit to rooney, i remember a while back he was going forward and there was a number of chances for him to dive but he kept at it and got a shot in

that's the wrong attitude to have, credit players for not diving when they could.
makes no sense.

Kingp35

Pigman II wrote:

Happens EVERY time.

Maybe I should go back to school

Nunu

I've mentioned this before in another thread but I think Ryan Giggs deserves a special mention. When it comes to divers wingers are normally the ones at it most because they dribble with the ball and go at players. I have seen a large percentage of Giggs games in his 15 year career and I have never seen him dive once, which is sadly exceptional in todays football climate.

On a side note he is also one of the cleanest and best tacklers I have ever seen. How many times has he tracked back into a full back position and won the ball back with his almost trademark 'hook' style of tackling. He's a fantastic professional.

PiE

There's a big difference between diving/going over easily to win a peno and going over with the explicit intention of getting another player sent off.

The first is smart. The second is filth and players who do it should be shot.