The Fall of English Football

The Premier League currently represents nothing short of a complete farce.  

 

The principles and high standard of football which made the league the best in the world have been left at the wayside. Clubs are being run as irrationally as a Paul Gascoigne fishing trip and racist stories left right and centre are rather depressing and shameful.

 

A worrying sight for Arsenal fans

Every neutral likes a high scoring game, but 7-5 'thriller' at the Madejski was a bit concerning. Arsenal fans were told to expect great things from their defence this season, with assistant Steve Bould cracking the whip. The only thing Bould was cracking open at the training ground last week was evidently a Bordeaux red with Arsene. Kosceilny and Djourou bought into the Halloween spirit with a horrific display of 'how not to defend' against Reading. Though their not the only culprits. Premier League defences can't keep a clean sheet for love or money. The likes of Ferdinand and Kompany don't look as assured as they were last season.

 

A team like Southampton will not stay up, guaranteed, with their current defence. It astounds me that Atkins made no effort to sign a capable experienced defender. The Saints are shipping goals so early in matches that they leave themselves with little hope come the second half. While I'm thoroughly enjoying watching the goals fly in, unlike Adebayor whose face betrays him on the Tottenham bench, some respectability needs to be restored in defending.

 

"I didn't dive!"

When Phil Neville is diving, you know the game has got out of hand. An honest pro, he apologised. But what does it say about the game is even he is attempting to fool the ref. It doesn't matter that it was in a derby. In fact it is worse. The game means even more to fans then the average one and if a player dives and benefits from it, fans are disgracefully cheated. And when an Arsenal fan is paying ridiculous amounts to see their team play they have every right to be aggrieved. It's then that you get offensive Twitter comments.

 

Diving is a vicious cycle which brings out the worst in fans and is ingraining itself into the English game quicker then snoods. Still, Torres didn't dive. Referees have a habit of picking up needlessly on the hot topic of the moment. Clattenburg was afraid of missing a dive, after endless comments by Tony Pulis and David Moyes. So he sent Torres off to make a statement, I think he had an inkling that Evans caught Torres. Nevertheless with Mike Riley in referees ears to clamp down on diving he went with his instinct. Look what happened in the aftermath.

Reading Oliver Holt's brilliant piece in The Mirror today about referees, it is true that referees are overly communicative with players. They don't need to be. We've now had a former England captain, foreign player and respected referee accused of racial slurs. Varied, the accusations seemingly show racism reaches further then we thought. And while it is admiral English football does not hide like Spain and Russia from racism, the saga has totally undermined the season so far.

 

Clark Carlisle, the kind of character the F.A lack

 

The F.A are a dysfunctional group of men who cannot relate to serious footballing matters. Something needs to be done, not by the F.A but by a fresh face. Because the Premier League is slowly getting polluted. I think Jason Roberts and Clark Carlisle are leaders who can really make a difference. The F.A should give them the proper backing and capabilities to do so. Not tiptoe around waiting for their pension.

A weekend of Gerrard pile drivers, Van Persie rockets and QPR catastrophes will distract us. But for how long. And how long before another accusation rises to front page news on the Daily Star.