My thoughts on that whole Arsenal thing? Jurrien Timber, that defender fella, he was right in the middle of a big old kerfuffle after a really rough challenge in the match at the Stadium of Light.
The Controversial Tackle
I saw him. He was already wearing a bandage ‘cause his head got bashed in the first half, but then he went and did another thing; he caught Sunderland’s Enzo Le Fee late when he was trying to shield the ball. It looked bad.
They did nothing. Referee Craig Pawson and the video helpers, the VAR, didn’t do a thing; Timber stayed right there playing. But Keith Hackett, a guy who used to be a big-shot ref in the Premier League, he thinks Timber absolutely should’ve seen a straight red card.
Hackett, he was really mad talking to Football Insider. “We’ve got a too-loose reading of the law,” he said, and “they ain’t seeing that these challenges, which are like semi-stomps on the boot or lower leg, they get let off.” I think he’s right that that kind of challenge is super dangerous. “He went past the ball, totally, and right into the player. That’s a bad move that needs a punishment, but no one gave it,” he said.
He did not hold back about the refs. “Players are real good at hiding bad tackles, and because the PGMOL (the ref bosses) are soft about it, we’re seeing more,” I heard him say. “For me, that challenge put the other player in danger. I am crystal clear that these moves gotta stop. The PGMOL needs to be tougher,” he insisted. He’s been around forever, that man. “Referees ought to be mostly worried about player safety. But these things are getting bigger. He should have got a red,” Hackett concluded, really firm.
This happened in the first part of the first half, which was a very rough, physical 45 minutes up at the Stadium of Light. Timber, he joined Arsenal just this summer and he’s been super important in their defense, but now people are asking if he can keep his temper. The people on the Arsenal bench, with the manager Mikel Arteta, they didn’t even react to the tackle right away, maybe they just trusted the people with the whistles.
Another Incident, A Different Call
He got away with it, but there was another fight between Sunderland’s Daniel Ballard and Arsenal’s Mikel Merino that people looked at too. Ballard, who played for Arsenal before, scored a goal and set one up, he seemed happy to be playing against his old team. It looked like he hit Merino with his elbow, which made Arteta on the side of the field furious.
They checked that one! Unlike the Timber thing, VAR did look at the Ballard-Merino clash and decided no red card was needed. Dermot Gallagher, another former big ref, agreed with what they decided. Talking on Sky Sports‘ “Ref Watch,” Gallagher explained, “VAR saw it. I do not think it is a foul. He was just using his arms to help him jump. Actually, Merino ran into him.” He added, “There was a bump but there is bumps all the time in soccer. That is good, hard defending.”
The way the two old refs saw things was totally different, which shows how judging a game is a tricky thing and how VAR is often controversial. Hackett’s very strong opinion about the Timber tackle tells me that there’s a growing worry about players getting hurt and if the refs are making the same calls all the time.
The PGMOL will probably check out the whole thing and tell Pawson what they think. If they’ll punish Timber after the game, I don’t know, but people will keep talking about his tackle for sure. What the PGMOL decides could change how refs handle these kinds of tackles later on.
The game ended, though the article did not say the final score. But the big talk is still about the refs and if Timber should have been kicked out, which could have changed the whole match. It’s just another reminder of how everyone watches the referees like hawks in soccer now.
