There has been much discussion about the Everton midfielder Jack Rodwell’s red card against Liverpool at Goodison Park on Saturday, and even some Liverpool players have defended the youngster’s tackle on Luis Suarez.
The Toffees boss David Moyes believes that the dismissal handed the points to Liverpool, and said after the game that he wasn’t even sure if an appeal was possible.
He said: “I just thought the sending off ruined the game. You get lots of questions from people asking about derbies, tackles and sendings off but that wasn’t even a bad tackle.
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“I don’t even know if we can appeal. I would have been disappointed had it been a free-kick and if he had got a yellow card I think people would have asked ‘what’s that for?’”
But last night the Everton Chief executive Robert Elstone confirmed that the club certainly will be able to appeal the decision. He said: “Following a review of the video evidence we believe the decision to be wrong and we will be contacting the FA requesting that the red card is rescinded.”
It will be interesting to see if Rodwell can get his three-game ban reduced, but Everton will never get a chance to get those three points back again.
It’s fascinating that Atkinson saw something from just about closer than anybody else bar Rodwell himself that warranted a Red Card (or in this case any other option i.e. yellow or a free kick). What could he possibly have seen? Never mind the advantage of video replay we all have if we watch on TV, what did he see in real time action? He didn’t see a vicious, studs-up reckless foul or anything that could have been interpreted as such, because it didn’t happen. It wasn’t half-a-dozen of one and six of the other, because NOBODY on line, in the press or media at large has defneded or agreed with the decision. So what’s the explanation? Is he biased?….Don’t know……bit of history with Moyes, and Atkinson is allegedly a human being so he might not be quite so even-handed as he should be. Is he a poor ref? …many say not especially those who run the game…mind you Blatter doesn’t do those who run the game’s repuattion any favours. What I believe happened is he assumed something, he certainly didn’t see it. He presumed it must have been an ovre-zealous tackle because of what happened afterwards not during. Suarez only did what umpteen players do in every match including Everton…look at Chaill who made a meal of his clash in the previous game in case he was going to be sent off for a fairly reckless challenge. Is Atkinson conned in every game, is he too proud of his “more red cards than any other ref reputation?”. He did what was unforgiveable for a ref, he awarded something albeit off-side, a goal, a free-kick because he GUESSED at it….he ABSOLUTELY didn’t see it and he must know that too. He has I trust damaged his erstwhile reputation and like other refs who make blatant errors, should be discreetly absent from refereeing for couple of weeks minimum. that might just temper his approach a bit and cause him to reflect. The way we cossett and cottonwool wrap our refs isn’t always good for their ego!