Referees are getting more and more stick for their decisions on the pitch, but it could be argued that their jobs are getting much harder.

Last week's Champions League tie between Barcelona and Manchester City saw a number of free kicks awarded for theatrical falls instead of real fouls.

In fact, many said that Italian referee Gianluca Rocchi had a poor game - Samri Nasri was lucky not to be sent off for a tackle on Neymar and there was some debate as to how much contact was made for Man City’s penalty (although you could say justice was done when it was saved!).

Football is an ever-changing game.

It's not just about being able to control a ball anymore; it's about having the mindset to know when and how to "over perform" contact in order to gain an advantage over your opposition.

I think Neymar shot himself in the foot against City - at the time I counted 7 rolls he made after going down. He looked like he had been one of the actors who is shot during Romeo and Juliet, not that he had been kicked in the leg.

While it was a shocking challenge - Neymar would have had more chance if he had gone down and stayed still rather than rolling round like an idiot. But that was just one of many.

There is a debate as to whether theatrically falling is cheating, but I think it's just bending the rules to gain an advantage.  Players want to win games and they will do anything in their power to make sure it happens.

So how do we expect referees to be able to tell the difference every time between a theatrical fall and a definite foul?  Whether it's cheating or not, it's making it harder for referees to decide on what is a foul and what is not.

Referees are on the lookout for theatrics when it comes to players going down- now the more they play up the less likely a player is to get anything from it.

But the whole point is, referees are not always going to get it right. They are only human after all, but as the game develops it's only fair that we remember that for the referees too.

David Silva was fuming when he was given a yellow card for a challenge on Lionel Messi - and even after pundits had seen the tackle numerous times - they still couldn’t decide between them whether it was a foul or not.

So if they can't do it with as many replays as they want - how do we expect referees to always get it right at the time?

Diving and making the most of a bit of contact is not going to be eliminated from the beautiful game, whether people want it to or not.  It's just not going to happen- it is here to stay!

We cannot expect referees to always to get it right and usually the right and wrong decisions even themselves out in a season, so maybe it's something we, as fans, are going to have to accept.

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