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Chelsea striker Fernando Torres will not face retrospective action for scratching Jan Vertonghen's face during Saturday's 1-1 draw with Tottenham.

The Football Association reviewed the incident after the Spaniard was captured on TV scratching the defender.

But a match official had already seen the players collide which means under FA rules no action can be taken.

The 29-year-old will serve a one-match ban after being sent off in the 82nd minute for two bookable offences.

Torres faced the prospect of his one-match ban being extended to four if he was found guilty of violent conduct.

The FA is trialling a new disciplinary system this season, which sees a panel of three former referees reviewing an incident and deciding whether charges should be made.

Under the old system, action was only taken if a referee viewed the footage and judged whether a player should have been sent off during the match.

But, under both systems, the FA cannot take further action if a match official witnesses part of the incident.

The FA said in a statement: (external) "One of the match officials saw the coming together of the two players, albeit not in its entirety.

"In these particular circumstances, in line with The FA's policy on when retrospective action may be taken, reviewed this summer by the game's stakeholders, no action may be taken."

 

http://m.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/24355751

 

So how exactly is the new disciplinary system different to the old one? The system was supposedly changed after the McManaman/Haidara incident but under the new system McManaman would still have faced no retrospective action as one of the officials was looking at the incident!

"we've reformed the system aren't we great! its now more difficult than ever to punish these guys for what they did!" :troll:

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http://bleacherreport.com/articles/1795485-the-beautiful-idea-of-andrea-pirlo-juventus-and-italy-regista-supreme

 

The Beautiful Idea of Andrea Pirlo, Juventus and Italy Regista Supreme

 

By

Jonathan Wilson

(Guest Columnist) on October 2, 2013

 

There is something rather beautiful about Andrea Pirlo—or at least the idea of Andrea Pirlo.

 

He is, as Jorge Valdano once said of Juan Roman Riquelme, a player who preserves the spirit of another age. To watch Pirlo at his best is to see a game in sepia; to drift into a gorgeous nostalgia in which football was played without rush by debonair men who stroked the ball about.

 

Like Riquelme, Pirlo seems an anachronism. He is not quick. He doesn’t charge about the pitch, and he is not one for conspicuous effort.

 

His effectiveness, rather, lies in his intelligence, his ability to conceptualise the pitch in its entirety, to know where teammates and opponents are and where they will be, allied to a sumptuous ability to craft a pass.

 

We call him old-fashioned because he doesn’t quite seem of our age, and we presume there must have been a time in which he fitted, but there never was such a time. Read match reports of the 1890s or the pioneering tactical columns in the Sheffield Green'Un, and you’ll find just the same complaints about football’s emphasis on speed as you find today.

 

But it’s nice to believe there was, and it’s a mark of Pirlo’s greatness that he can awake nostalgia for a golden age that never existed.

 

Italian football has long admired the regista—a word also used for a film director. It is used to mean playmaker, wherever on the pitch he plays—and Pirlo, of course, did have a time under Carlo Ancelotti at AC Milan as a more orthodox No. 10, but it tends to be used of those rare players who sit deep, dictating the play from in front of the defensive line.

 

Ancelotti himself played in something approximating to that role as the conductor of Arrigo Sacchi’s orchestra—although nobody really sat that deep in a team that pressed ferociously hard.

 

Falcao and Toninho Cerezo played as twin registas in the Brazil side at the 1982 World Cup and both had distinguished careers in Serie A with Roma and Sampdoria respectively. There are numerous holding midfielders who circulate the ball—the likes of Sergio Busquets and Michael Carrick—but there have been very few who have the range of passing to be a true playmaker from deep.

 

http://cdn.bleacherreport.net/images_root/article/media_slots/photos/001/099/139/Brazil19824-2-2-2_original.jpg?1380727161

 

Xabi Alonso is the best modern example other than Pirlo. Dragan Stojkovic, perhaps, towards the end of his career would fall into a similar category, but there have been very few.

 

Yet, perhaps Pirlo is less a glimpse into a lost past than a possible future.

 

Carlos Alberto Parreira has spoken of how Mario Zagallo, in the early '90s, described his vision of how football would be decades later. He foresaw two lines of players, constantly interchanging around a playmaker. The key is how space can be created for the regista; even the most gifted require a fraction of a second to assess their options.

 

To an extent, the changes in the offside law over the past two decades have created that, particularly the redefinition in 2006 of what it is to be interfering. Teams are warier now of pushing out and playing an offside trap, which has had the effect of stretching the effective playing area from sometimes as little as 40 yards to nearer 70. That in turn creates space and was one of the reasons behind the successes of Barcelona’s team of diminutive technicians.

 

But Pirlo has succeeded at Juventus in part because of the players around him. The three central defenders offer protection, and he can even at times drop so deep as to effectively become part of a back four, with Giorgio Chiellini and Andrea Barzagli adept at shuffling slightly wider.

 

http://cdn.bleacherreport.net/images_root/article/media_slots/photos/001/099/142/JuventusspaceforPirlo_original.jpg?1380727267

 

At the same time, Leonardo Bonucci takes some of the pressure off Pirlo with his ability to step forward from the back and spread long passes. The energy and tenacity of whichever two of Arturo Vidal, Paul Pogba and Claudio Marchisio are selected mean his lack of defensive capacity is rarely exposed, while also giving him the room—freed from marking responsibilities—in which to direct the play.

 

He’s 34 now and as his career perhaps at last is slowing to a halt, Pirlo remains an anachronism. Possibly, though, he is less a hangover of a golden past than a herald of things to come.

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http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/football/24363625

Non-league chairmen accuse FA of match-fixing inaction

The Football Association has been accused of a "dereliction of duty" after failing to question three non-league clubs about suspicious betting activity on a number of games.

After reading of the link between the three dubious Essex clubs (especially AFC Hornchurch) and the scandal here in Australia, describing the FA's inaction as "deriliction" is generous. It borders on complicit.

 

Are there any anti-gambling crusading type politicians (or grassroots organisations) in the UK who might make a suitable hue and cry about this?

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The Brazil FA has objected to Diego Costa being allowed to play for Spain, the matter will go to the Players' Statutory Commission.

 

Can't wait for the reactions of the Brazilian crowds when we play over there for Summerslam the World Cup.

 

Spain won.

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What is Diego Costa's claim to being Spanish. Unless I am misunderstanding something, he is fully raised in Brazil and never even saw Spain until he was an adult. FIFA needs to ban this sort of thing. Unless someone has proven lineage in the new nation or moved there before attaining professional status, they should not be allowed to change football nationalities unless there are extenuating circumstances. "Being a talented footballer" is not a satisfactory reason. It is the same nonsense Holland tried to pull with Saloman Kalou all of those years ago.

African legends such as Nwankwo Kanu, Yaya Toure, Obi Mikel, Drogba, and Adebayor stuck on the rubbish Overground line. Owen at Oxford Circus. Some women at my cousin's stop. This map disappoints me greatly.

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What is Diego Costa's claim to being Spanish. Unless I am misunderstanding something, he is fully raised in Brazil and never even saw Spain until he was an adult. FIFA needs to ban this sort of thing. Unless someone has proven lineage in the new nation or moved there before attaining professional status, they should not be allowed to change football nationalities unless there are extenuating circumstances. "Being a talented footballer" is not a satisfactory reason. It is the same nonsense Holland tried to pull with Saloman Kalou all of those years ago.

 

Costa never played professionally in Brazil actually.

 

Doing this kind of thing is not something I like, but ultimately if the player wishes to play for Spain and is a Spanish national I don't see it being that big of an issue.

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What is Diego Costa's claim to being Spanish. Unless I am misunderstanding something, he is fully raised in Brazil and never even saw Spain until he was an adult. FIFA needs to ban this sort of thing. Unless someone has proven lineage in the new nation or moved there before attaining professional status, they should not be allowed to change football nationalities unless there are extenuating circumstances. "Being a talented footballer" is not a satisfactory reason. It is the same nonsense Holland tried to pull with Saloman Kalou all of those years ago.

 

Costa never played professionally in Brazil actually.

 

Doing this kind of thing is not something I like, but ultimately if the player wishes to play for Spain and is a Spanish national I don't see it being that big of an issue.

He was brought to Portugal and started his career there as an adult from what I can gather. This case isn't particularly egregious admittedly, but under the current rules there is nothing stopping some desperate country from creating lax nationalisation laws for athletes and and simple creating a national team that is really just an all-star foreign side from their local league.

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What is Diego Costa's claim to being Spanish. Unless I am misunderstanding something, he is fully raised in Brazil and never even saw Spain until he was an adult. FIFA needs to ban this sort of thing. Unless someone has proven lineage in the new nation or moved there before attaining professional status, they should not be allowed to change football nationalities unless there are extenuating circumstances. "Being a talented footballer" is not a satisfactory reason. It is the same nonsense Holland tried to pull with Saloman Kalou all of those years ago.

 

Costa never played professionally in Brazil actually.

 

Doing this kind of thing is not something I like, but ultimately if the player wishes to play for Spain and is a Spanish national I don't see it being that big of an issue.

He was brought to Portugal and started his career there as an adult from what I can gather. This case isn't particularly egregious admittedly, but under the current rules there is nothing stopping some desperate country from creating lax nationalisation laws for athletes and and simple creating a national team that is really just an all-star foreign side from their local league.

 

Qatar.

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