Neville Kneville
Well-Known Member
Well, I’m clear-headed enough to admit that if an opposition player had made that tackle on Jesus or Sergio and they hadn’t been red carded I would have been livid. Where I differ from others is that I honestly believe, hand on heart, that we still would have won. We were that far above them in terms of class. That is the huge difference with the Luiz tackled on Sergio last season. We’d been battering Chelsea all match. Luiz off, and there’s no way Chelsea are winning that. They were already under the cosh. Well, we’ve had some highly malicious decisions against us this season (Walker, Sterling) and, let’s admit it, some highly benign ones (Silva the other day, Vinny yesterday). Unlike last season , it is evening itself out.
Revelling in the three points, but a minor grouse - wish that David Silva had his shooting boots on a bit more often. He should have had a hat-trick yesterday, quite frankly. And I would love to see that happen.
It's fair comment that it's evening itself out this season. We can have no complaints, right now, on that score.
But, traditionally it isn't this stage of the season where we get shit on & the rags get a helping hand, it's when it gets really tough & teams are up against it. That's when the refs usually kick in for them & shit all over us & that"s exactly how it was when we won the league under Mancini. So nothing can be taken for granted just because we have had the run of it recently.
Re Kompany, yes it's a red card, in reality, but based on typical reffing, which isn't based on reality, no it isn't. Stones was close enough to create doubt, level with Vardy, so it's not a red card unless the ref guesses that Vardy will get there before him, which he likely would but not certainly. A sliding tackle, as he ran with the ball, might have rescued it.. It's not the ref's job to guess, he has to be certain & he has to do it without the benefit of a replay to work it out. Had Stones been a few yards wider or in front, Kompany would have been off.