David Beckham

**bigboab** · 10-12-2004, 05:00 PM

I can’t seem to find a SportsWorld. So I put this in here.

Explanation: In international football, if a player receives two yellow cards or one red card in a competition he is automatically banned from the next game in that competition.

Today in the papers David Beckham, the English team captain, revealed that he deliberately fouled Ben Thatcher in the Wales game on Saturday. This was in order that he could get ‘rid of’ his one yellow card by making it a one match ban. As he was going to miss the next match because of injury he saw this as killing two birds with one stone.

Should any football player in particular the English captain be allowed to get away with his unsporting behaviour? In my opinion he should be stripped of his captaincy and pulled up before the FA and made to answer for his actions with at least a two or three match ban.

O.K. it may be an intelligent thing to do. But to tell the newspapers that is what you did negates the ‘intelligent’.

**DanB** · 10-12-2004, 05:11 PM

Becks our thug captain

**enoughfakefiles** · 10-12-2004, 05:13 PM

I can`t believe he`s actually admitted to doing this.

**manker** · 10-12-2004, 05:13 PM

Obviously this kind of thing happens all the time in Soccer where this rule is enforced. Whether Beckham is punished or not players will continue to exploit this loophole, not just by coinciding planned injury treatment with suspensions but also getting suspended to coincide with your team playing a poor team or when your manager has told you that you're likely to be dropped anyway.

It's the system that is flawed, Beckham isn't doing anything different from other players. What he did wrong is to tell the press.

The rules need to be changed slightly but this is a difficult problem to work out. There aren't many alternatives. Getting a ban for 2 yellow cards is ridiculous anyway IMO, this means that midfielders (who make more tackles) are more likely to be banned than strikers or goalkeepers, meaning that each squad needs more midfielders to cope with suspensions.

If the rule was changed to give more leeway wrt yellow cards leading to suspension then this would been that the skillful players would get kicked shitless (for want of a better expression) that would be worse.

The Soccer authorities are fully aware of managers urging their players to engage in this practice (did you think Beckham thought it up himself

) but there is little that can be done to stop it. Speaking to the press about it can be stopped easily tho' In private Beckham will get a bollocking, no doubt.

**Cheese** · 10-12-2004, 06:29 PM

The only way I can think to make it fair would be to re-injure Beckham after he has served his suspension.

**DanB** · 10-12-2004, 06:31 PM

Originally Posted by Withcheese

The only way I can think to make it fair would be to re-injure Beckham after he has served his suspension.

Don't we have any more qualifiers?

**baccyman** · 10-12-2004, 06:35 PM

i would laugh if Ben Thatcher had Beckham done for assault if he has said what he is alleged to have said then he has admitted his guilt.

**Emdee** · 10-12-2004, 06:56 PM

I'm betting that Beckham pulls a U-turn pretty swiftly after a few words with his agent.

**Gemby!** · 10-12-2004, 06:58 PM

Originally Posted by bigboab

Should any football player in particular the English captain be allowed to get away with his unsporting behaviour? In my opinion he should be stripped of his captaincy and pulled up before the FA and made to answer for his actions with at least a two or three match ban.

O.K. it may be an intelligent thing to do. But to tell the newspapers that is what you did negates the ‘intelligent’.

Ban him !!

It's unsporting behaviour, and David Beckham is a twat, making it obvious that a ban is needed