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I can sympathise with Matic's reaction, I'd have done the same (or worse!) but it is a red card and he has to accept that.
The blame there lies with the FA. The rules that are in place mean that Barnes can't be punished. Costa was retrospectively banned for something 'off the ball' yet it was committed in plain sight of the referee as was Barnes' tackle.
Eduardo and Diaby both had the top flight careers pretty much ended by horrific tackles like that on Matic - it should carry a much more serious ban than three games commensurate with the amount of damage that can be done. For me he would miss the same time as Suarez nibbling someone on the neck. I guess that is a hard thing to adjudicate on but it would cut out poor/reckless/dangerous tackles.
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Tenderloin
dan
I couldn't agree more. Awful challenge.
Interesting that the two podcasts I listen to on a semi-regular basis (The Guardian and The Times) took quite different POV's on the incident. Amazingly, Richardson et al on Football Weekly seemed to decide that the challenge wasn't that bad because he got something of the ball, which is a pretty ridiculous way of looking at it in my opinion. The Times disagreed (thankfully), saying that whether or not he got anything of the ball was irrelevant. Which it is. They then went on to have quite an interesting discussion about the fact that players who have been fouled and react badly are usually punished more than the person who committed the (potentially career ending) foul in the first place. Something I've always had an issue with.
I genuinely think Matic should have got a yellow card (if you look at this shove, it really is just a shove - it's the fact that he reacts at all which earns him the red) and Barnes should be suspended for some time.