Arsene Wenger, the manager of the Arsenal football team, has recently spoken out against the current disciplinary system in the football world and says that he would like to see an ethics committee installed which will have the ability to over rule the decisions of referees.
The current rules from the football Association state that it is not possible for a player to be punished in retrospect if no officials in the match saw the incident where the rules were broken. The complaint has come about after a match last month where a player was injured by another but the game continued because no official saw the problem.
This was a decision that was met with a great deal of criticism and the whole situation has been made much worse as much smaller infractions have been punished much more heavily, suggesting that there could be bias among some referees.
Arsene Wenger has said that the system just lacks the common sense of systems in other sports and he would like to see it overhauled in the immediate future. He has commented, “The current system basically means that if it’s out of sight for a referee then its out of mind.
A player could openly punch another player and if no official saw it, then it will go unpunished, no matter what is revealed through video footage later on. For anyone who loves the game of football they should support a reform of these rules as they are clearly ridiculous and need to be changed.”
Mr Wenger added, “There are so many things in football to work well but this is an area where there is so much friction it can be very frustrating for fans as well as players. Of course, the decision of a referee should be respected, but there should be a higher authority.”