Andy Carroll’s Red
Most of today’s discussion was always going to be surrounding Andy Carroll‘s red card at the hands of Chico Flores’ play acting on Saturday, and it’s no surprise that the club have appealed it.
Howard Webb played in to the hands of Chico’s reaction and wrongly showed Carroll the red card when, in all honestly, it should have been a free-kick to us and perhaps a booking for the Swansea defender for climbing all over Andy’s back and having his arm round his neck.
But that’s all in the past now and no tweet, letter, campaign or protest is ever going to influence the FA’s decision, other than the club’s official appeal.
What I have been more interested in is the reaction from the Swansea fans, who appear to be of mixed opinion on one of their forums, www.thejackarmy.net.
Here are just a couple of comments I came across earlier this evening…
The key question about Cheato tho is one everyone wants to know.
How is his scalp? Top of his head took one heck of a glancing blow. Will he have to use special shampoo on his flowing locks from now on to repair the damage? Will the Prem league have to give special dispensation to use a hairnet the next few weeks? Will the damage have to be repaired by one of those clinics Shane Warne promotes?
You know what, with everyone queuing up to knock Chico, Carroll’s part in this seems to have been forgotten. Chico challenged him hard but fairly and Carroll didn’t like it one bit. The boy got a taste of his own medicine and lashed out like the petulant bully he is. It was only luck that he didn’t catch Chico harder because he wasn’t looking where his arm went… and I guess he didn’t care.
Perhaps Chico, who is probably finding it difficult anyway to break the European mould of overreacting, felt that he needed to draw the referee’s attention to what was a red card offence. Perhaps he didn’t want to leave it to the referee’s discretion because we’ve all seen what happens then. We get cheated and we lose points. Okay, we lost anyway this time but Carroll should miss three games, which is as it should be.
Make of those what you will, but it seems the general consensus amongst Swans fans is that Chico should not have reacted the way he did and they are left embarrassed by his actions, but Andy Carroll still deserved the red card because of his ‘intent’ to hurt Chico.
One of the most surprising developments to come out of this whole farce is the reports that the club are preparing to take the FA to the High Court should they fail to rescind Carroll’s dismissal and subsequent three-match ban.
According to MailOnline, club officials believe the FA’s current appeals procedure is flawed under European Law.
I’m not sure whether that’s just us clutching at straws, or whether he would actually have a case, but what I am sure of is that the last thing we could do with at this stage of the season is a distraction in the shape of a court case as we battle to stay in the Premier League.
The best thing we can do if the FA do not overturn Webb’s decision is to just get on with it and show the rest of the league, and most importantly ourselves, that we are NOT a one man team. Yes, Andy Carroll is a very important asset of ours and he makes a big difference, but we cannot rely on him all the time.
Carroll gets a welcome surprise
One of the funniest developments coming out of this Andy Carroll story is what he discovered in the Hammers changing room when he made his way back after being dismissed.
Sky Sports News presenter Charlie Webster had just finished a 250-mile charity run across 40 football grounds and was given permission to use the club’s facilities to recover from here superb efforts.
So when Carroll stormed in to the changing room and prepared to have an ice bath, he was pleasantly surprised to find Webster already in it. Superb.
Jordan Spence
One of the club’s longest serving Academy products has given an interview to one of his friend’s blogs, and it happens to be one of the best and most insightful interviews given by a footballer I have ever had the pleasure of reading.
Spence talks of his time so far as a footballer and puts in to perspective what it feels like to be in with a chance of first-team action one season, only to be shipped out on loan to several different clubs the next.
He is a player who appreciates the privileges he has in life, but refuses to take them for granted.
For example, one of his most admirable quotes from the article reads: “My biggest gripe with playing football is that sometimes I get paid to not play football.”
When was the last time a footballer admitted that?
You can read his full interview here.
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