Mark Hughes thinks that Jack Wilshere should have been sent off on Sunday but nobody seems to care that Dusan Tadic should have received two red cards for absolutely awful ‘tackles’.
There weren’t even two minutes on the clock when Tadic introduced Reiss Nelson to the terrible standards of refereeing in the Premier League that offer players little by way of protection.
Tadic raked his studs down Nelson’s leg, so far from the ball he had no intention of trying to play it.
Later in the game, Tadic crunched into Alex Iwobi, his studs connecting half way up the Nigerian’s shin.
This time, the referee didn’t even give a free kick, let alone a card.
Over the weekend, we saw a lot of discussion about how Ashley Young should have seen red for his tackle on Sergio Aguero.
It was a carbon copy of Tadic on Iwobi at Ashburton Grove on Sunday.
In the Telegraph on Monday, former referee Keith Hackett accuses Martin Atkinson of putting player’s safety at risk in the Manchester game, yet two similar tackles by Tadic doesn’t even warrant a mention in the media.
In Monday’s Daily Mail, their resident refereeing expert, Graham Poll, addresses both the United and Arsenal matches.
About Arsenal he discusses how dealing with Wilshere would have avoided red cards for anyone.
About the United game, he talks about how Young should have seen red.
But it’s not just the papers who are ignoring both red-card fouls (there was no mention of either tackle in the Mail’s match report, nor the Mirror, The Times, the S*n, Guardian, Daily Star, Daily Telegraph or any other major outlet that I checked this morning). Match of the Day Two didn’t show either incident either which is just staggering given how bad the tackles were.
What all this means is that Tadic is unlikely to see any sort of retroactive punishment for two tackles that could, on a different day, have resulted in a serious injury.
The FA seem inclined to act only when they are forced into it by the media.
There is no uproar here, so there will be no retroactive punishment.
Mohamed Elneny, meanwhile, will serve a three-game ban for barely touching a Southampton player even though others in that whole Jack-inspired shambles raised their hands higher and harder.
If only we had some sort of technology to help out referees….