Bowing for the mighty and powerful « Untold Arsenal: Arsenal News, supporting the club, the players and the manager
By Walter Broeckx
So Mike Dean has once again shown his true colours. The one that shows he is a person who will do what is the wisest thing for his career. And only his career.
If tomorrow he knows that giving Arsenal a few penalties so they win a game, he will do it as long as he knows that this will benefit him in the future.
Now it is still very wise to be on good terms with the manager of Manchester United and so he will not write a single word about him in his match report. So a manager can from now on go out and rant with the 4th ref and that is already a very common procedure from all managers. In a way he is the one that takes most of the heat away from the ref.
But according to Mike Dean a manager can go and have words with the assistant in an angry way. And maybe we can have a closer look at some words spoken by this manager against the press.
I take this from the Sky website and quote: “Asked about the controversial Evans own goal after the match, Ferguson said: “The linesman correctly whistled for offside, because Cisse was in an offside position when the cross was made and he also pulled on Evans’ arm.
“If that’s not interference, what is interference? That’s the point I was making to Mike Dean.”
However, the Premier League have backed Dean and issued a clarification which said that “as Cisse did not play the ball, then he was not interfering with play”.
The league added: “It is also the case that Cisse didn’t interfere with the opponent.”
Now for any one of us reading this it is well a bit laughable don’t you think. I quote again and if the words are wrong blame Sky not me: “The linesman correctly whistled for offside”
Now I am a ref and an assistant-referee myself and believe me as an assistant I have never “whistled” for offside. Because the thing we have in our hands is called a flag. And maybe I will try it next time but I swear that if I can whistle on my flag I will buy the entire Emirates a drink next time I come around.
Quotes can be checked here: http://www1.skysports.com/football/news/11667/8363114/The-FA-will-not-be-taking-action-against-Sir-Alex-Ferguson-over-his-Boxing-Day-touchline-rant
In another article on the BBC website this time http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/football/20847458 and again I quote:
“”The referee changed the linesman’s mind,” said the Scot.”
What is really mind staggering is that at his age and experience this manager obviously is not aware of the fact that it is the ref who takes the final decision. Any assistant can wave his flag from the first till the last minute for whatever he wants, only the ref makes the decisions at the end. This is nothing new in the rule book as far as I know it has always been like this.
So looking at these quotes and words one can really start to wonder: does SAF know the rules? And most of all: is he still in a very stable mental condition? Because honestly these are words that one could expect from the local drunk fan in the pub but not from a PL manager.
However let us return to the ranting against the officials. According to his report they didn’t happen. And thus the FA will not take action.
This shows that Dean is a rather cowardly person who doesn’t dare :
a) send Ferguson to the stands after his rant
b) protect his assistant from the rant of Ferguson
c) he bows over to the all mighty whenever is needed.
But not writing it down in his report is opening the door for all managers to have a go at the ref, assistant, 4th ref in front of the camera.
And again and this is not for the first time I have to write this down when ref Dean is in the middle of things: DEAN IS LETTING THEN THOUSANDS OF REFS AND ASSISTANTS DOWN ALL OVER THE COUNTRY AND ALL OVER THE WORLD!!!
So any ref who gets the abuse of managers over his head next week : only one person to thank for: Mike Dean. He is the one who didn’t stood up to it and he is the one responsible for managers thinking they can get away with it.
In fact for not including it in his match report I feel Dean should be banned from games in the PL for a while. Not just for not writing the report but for harming all referees who have to do a game in the next days and who will be abused.
But as far as I have observed Mr. Dean he will not be impressed by this. He knows that he has saved his career for the moment. And I do have the feeling that is all what matters for him. And all those other refs….they don’t count for Dean. I do have some problems with calling you a “colleague” to be honest because your behaviour not very collegial.
In Dutch we have such a great idiom for such people with a lovely rhyme. I translated it to English and changed it a bit so you can enjoy the rhyme:
I am not your brother, everything for me and nothing at all for another.
PS: I will add another article about this going on to the next step a bit: match delegates and their reports.
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