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KENNY DALGLISH has accused the Football Association of double standards after they successfully appealed against Wayne Rooney’s three-match ban for Euro 2012.
Rooney’s punishment for lashing out at Montenegro’s Miodrag Dzudovic in October has been reduced to a two-game suspension following a UEFA hearing in Nyon.
It means the Manchester United striker will be available for England’s final Group D match against co-hosts Ukraine next summer.
However, Dalglish believes, considering the FA impose automatic three-match bans on Premier League players who are dismissed for violent conduct, it was wrong of them to seek a shorter suspension.
Earlier this week the FA hit Liverpool with two charges in relation in Monday’s 1-0 defeat at Fulham. Luis Suarez was charged with improper conduct following an alleged offensive gesture towards home fans, while the club are in the dock for their players’ conduct following the dismissal of Jay Spearing.
“I don’t think it sets a very good standard that they appeal against Wayne’s three-match ban,” Dalglish said. “I think it calls into question their own disciplinary system.
“It’s understandable because Wayne is a fantastic footballer but it’s not as if it was a 50-50 challenge. So I don’t know how they justify diluting it.
“If it’s a straight red, it’s three games. If they can justify diluting Wayne’s then everyone else who appeals for a similar sending off in a Premier League game will expect to have their ban reduced.”
Club England managing director Adrian Bevington responded to Dalglish’s criticism by saying that a major difference exists between how the FA and UEFA handle disciplinary matters.
In contrast to FA rules, there is no set length of ban for a red card in international football.
In a statement the FA said: “To promote speed and consistency, stakeholders in England agreed a standard formula encompassing a fixed penalty sanction should be applied across the game by the FA.
“UEFA chooses to operate a different process for European matches, based on a sliding scale, under which each sanction is determined individually by a disciplinary panel.
“This process meets the demands of UEFA football where the period between fixtures is greater than that in the domestic game.”
The argument remains that the FA should have accepted Rooney’s punishment considering that if they had received a similar appeal for a domestic incident the suspension would have been increased to four matches if it had been deemed frivolous.
It is believed the FA pointed out that a three-match ban that affects games in the finals of a major tournament is a harsher sanction than a suspension of a similar length which would just affect matches in a qualifying tournament.
