Glad to see UEFA taking action…let’s hope other bodies follow suit

Football FanCast columnist David Mooney feels UEFA were right to throw the book at Eduardo and hopes that it will start a precedent, by all the Footballing bodies, to punish those cheats within the game.

So then, an Arsenal player falls to the floor when a stiff breeze from an on-rushing goalkeeper exerts a force upon his legs similar to that of a hazelnut slamming against a skyscraper, and, when said Arsenal player is charged by UEFA for engaging in an attempt to deceive match officials, a large number of people – not just Arsenal fans – decide that the only way to respond is with a good bit of outrage. How dare he be charged for simulation when he… simulated? 

I am, of course, talking about Eduardo's… err… dive… against Celtic, when the Brazilian-cum-Croatian… err… dived… under a challenge from goalkeeper Artur Boruc. And after he… err… dived… the referee awarded a penalty, and he duly dispatched it, virtually sending Celtic out of the tie. 

And Eduardo has been charged by UEFA. This means that if he is found guilty of simulation, then he could face a two game ban.  

Good. I'm glad. 

I don't care that nobody's ever been banned for it before, they should have been – rules is rules. He wasn't touched, but he fell over anyway when it became obvious he wouldn't be able to get the ball around the keeper into the net. That's cheating. People who cheat should face punishments. It's simple. 

I've had the radio on a lot of the day and it's been something of a hot topic. So, before I go any further, let me make it clear that Eduardo did not deserve to get a penalty because if he'd have carried on, then Boruc would have fouled him. If that would have been the case, he should move the ball on and then let the keeper foul him; instead he decided to fall over with no contact. It's not a penalty. 

If a defender avoids a handball by moving his arm away from the ball at the last second, the referee doesn't give a free-kick because it would have been had he not moved. 

But it was self-preservation! If Eduardo didn't dive, he might have been injured, especially after coming back from such a bad injury! No. Tough. There was no contact between him and the goalkeeper and, until there is, it's going to be a dive. And if he's not fit enough to be challenged by a goalkeeper, then he's not fit enough to be playing football. 

Ok, so other players in the past have dived in the past. Correct. And they weren't punished for their simulation. Also correct. But just because they weren't punished doesn't mean that they shouldn't be. And if it takes Eduardo receiving a two match ban to begin the process, then so be it. 

I accept and understand that, if a player is caught cheating by the referee in a match, then he receives a yellow card, which is not equal with a two match ban. But retrospectively banning divers is the best way to put players off from doing it – whether they were booked for it or not. Give them a yellow card if caught, then add the ban on afterwards. 

It's not the only way, but I don't think my suggestions of mild, team-wide electric shocks is going to be looked upon in a good light by the powers that be. Perhaps all cheats should be made to stand in the centre of the town of the team they were playing with a placard that says: "I am a cheat. This is my punishment. I am sorry for what I did". 

There's two ways we can move forward. We can either do nothing, and allow players to dive to the ground to win penalties, free-kicks and good goal-scoring opportunities. Or we can introduce measures to try and prevent them from doing it. And I fall firmly into the second camp. 

Why should Eduardo be allowed to fake contact and fall down? It's not within the rules. 

"It's always been part of the game and gives us something to talk about in the pub." Rubbish. It may well have always been part of the game, but, first off, old traditions aren't always the best and, secondly, all that ever gets discussed in the pub after events like this one is that something should be done about it. 

Retrospective punishment in the form of match bans is perfect. It affects the team, so the manager will be hacked off that one of his players isn't allowed to play. It also affects the player because he misses out on a game and gets some choice words from his manager. 

And shame on you Arsène Wenger for your reaction. I don't see how singling out a player to be a cheat is unacceptable. Eduardo dived. There was no contact. He fell to the floor in such a way that would make it appear to the referee that he was fouled. That is cheating. By cheating, a player shows himself to be a cheat. UEFA's decision to charge Eduardo does not brand him a cheat; he's done a pretty good job of that himself, already. 

Wenger suggested that the Croat had taken evasive action after his injury. Football is a physical game. I understand jumping out of the way of tackles or not diving in, but falling to the ground to avoid being fouled? Odd one. Like I said earlier, if his leg's not strong enough to take being tackled, he shouldn't be playing. 

And even if that's true, surely he should have got up and told the referee it wasn't a penalty. Then, if the referee insisted it was, he could always have missed it. But professionals don't do that, apparently.  

Apparently it's much more professional to do nothing and score the resulting spot kick. 

Cheating has to be weeded out of the game. The referee's job is to make sure that a match comes to a fair result – in other words, to make sure two teams play by the rules and the correct result is the outcome. But referees can be deceived, they're only human, and if it's proved that they have been, then the player responsible should be punished. If that punishment is a ban, it'll soon dissuade players from doing it. 

My only worry with this is that UEFA have set the precedent, but they won't stick to it. They now have to uphold that in the future. I'll wait with baited breath on that one, because consistency from the top is something that football has struggled with for years. If someone cheats in the next round of the Champions League and doesn't get punished, then this week's action has been worth nothing. 

And, let's get this straight too, it shouldn't be just UEFA who challenge cheats. The FA and all governing bodies should do it. But they need to do it even handedly – I've still not forgiven the FA for retrospectively (and correctly) punishing Shaun Wright-Phillips's kick on Rory Delap, but retrospectively (and incorrectly) ignoring José Bosingwa's karate kick on Yossi Benayoun. 

So please FA, UEFA, FIFA… Football… Give us consistency in your retrospective decisions. And please make sure that this Eduardo incident is the first of many, where the cheats are exposed for what they are and punished for it.

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