At the time of writing, there has been no hint that Harry Arter will receive retrospective punishment for the dive he used to con Anthony Taylor against Arsenal on Sunday.

With the score poised at 2-1 to Arsenal, the Cardiff midfielder flung himself to the ground. Anthony Taylor, despite having a clear and close view, blew his whistle, gave a free-kick and Cardiff equalised from the resulting free-kick.

Arter, who could have been booked at least three times, finally saw yellow in the 92nd minute for hacking down Lucas Torreira, but there were no consequences for his dive and if no charge follows then the FA are making a mockery of their own attempts to clean up the game.

The new law states that a player can face retrospective action and a possible two-game ban if he cheats and it is missed by the referee.

I’m not sure how this is anything other than a textbook description of what the law was brought in to deal with:

Reading through the papers and every major website covering the game on Monday morning, there was no mention of an Arter ban even being a possibility. I didn’t catch Match of the Day 2 but from Twitter, I could tell they didn’t bother covering it at all either. Nor did Sky Sports News who didn’t show the dive.

I did, however, read a few articles asking if Shkodran Mustafi would be banned or fined for his ‘political’ celebration in support of Granit Xhaka, who assisted him. He won’t be, but this is the only ‘controversial’ talking point that has persisted from the game.

mustafi celebration
via Getty

But Harry ‘he’s English, innit’ Arter? Not a single word. Yes, he is English. He might be a Republic of Ireland international but he was born and raised in Sidcup.

As we know with these things, the FA are rarely prompted to act without a media outcry.

No outcry, no charge and no hope of the game’s authorities doing what’s needed to cut out the ‘scourge’ of the game.

You can bet your bottom dollar that if it had been Ozil doing the dive, we’d be hearing about nothing else…