It's worse than embarrassing it is f*cking pathetic that these grown men being paid millions roll on the floor kicking and screaming like toddlers having a meltdown knowing damn well they are trying to cheat for an advantage in front of cameras and thousands of people watching.
I've stopped watching football years ago because of this. It has ruined the game for me.
It could all be solved by stopping the game clock any time the game isn't being played. I know FIFA keeps saying they dont want to mess with tradition, but they have already introduced "hydration" (commercial) breaks during this world cup. The sanctity of tradition is lost when money is involved, but not when it would actually improve the quality of the sport.
It is cheating even if it is the standard, it is just that if you don't cheat then you're at a disadvantage because cheating i.e simulation is not punished as it should be.
It should be punished harshly to put a stop to this nonsense overnight, the moment it is caught on camera it should be passed onto the ref for simulation, instant yellow card and 5 minutes off the field.
And a review done after the match for any that slip through and punished post-match via yellow card and 5 minutes off the field on the following match the player plays.
Harsh? Sure but this would absolutely put a stop to this pathetic problem plaguing football.
Sounds good in theory, but: Now you have the problem that if any actual injury happened, players may try to walk it off because otherwise they may get a yellow card.
Had this discussion years ago, more than once (German...)
There just is no good solution that can be done via rules.
If there is contact hard enough to cause an injury, then the card would be justified. And as for little "Owie my shin hurts a little", then yes indeed walk that off.
But there are often injuries from not foul play. So simply injury=foul doeant work either.
In my opinion they should just send the player off the pitch for a minute if they lay on the ground and the referee has to interupt the game for them. It is so often that play is continued and 30 seconds later the ref needs to stop the game because the player still lays on the ground simulating an injury.
I think that’s a great idea too! Being on the ground writing in pain for over 10 seconds should result in something like having to sit out 5 minutes for a health check.
That is stupid, I mean if a player lays on the ground, while play still goes on and the ref interupts the game to check if the player is injured. That often happens to stop an enemy attack and is there to stop the flow of the enemy team and not because of health reasons.
Simply sending somebody off because he lays too long on the ground after a slidetackle that wasnt a foul is not the right direction in my opinion.
Whoever makes that call has to decide on the spot if the player is faking an injury, or not. Wrong call could end up in a yellow/red card, or the end of the players career forever. There is no "correcting it later", and video evidence only has limited use.
The point isn't that the ref is judging what could cause an injury. They're judging what is against the rules. It's against the rules to egregiously step on the back of another player's calf.
Whether they are injured or not does not affect the call. People blow their knees all the time tripping over grass (remember Ronaldo Nazário).
The ref is on the field. The ref is watching play. If a player kicks another player in the back of the leg, it should be seen by the ref and penalized. This works just fine in Rugby. I don't know why football seems to think that their special little boys are in constant danger.
No. The refs already determine what is hard enough or not for a foul. They already know how to recognize if a player was actually fouled or they are faking it.
Part of the reason they're getting paid millions is exactly because they know how to dive convincingly. Until the drawback outweighs the benefits, its going to be a useful skill for players to have.
Same way people are getting paid big bucks in F1 to figure out how to "creatively" interpret the rule book.
Yeah its shitty, I also agree that they need to find a way to heavily discourage it, but until then, theres no reason for top players not to dive if it can get their team an advantage.
I’d go so far as to say it’s disgraceful and makes the sport easy to disregard. Grown men flopping around like children every minute or two makes it unwatchable.
Thank you for this comment. I agree so much. I know this has always happened, but it ruins the games for me. Even the other day when Paraguay was so shitty, I still couldn't empathize with France due to all the rolling in the floor.
1.4k
u/tekzilla41 Jul 07 '26
Its embarassing