THE Football Association continues to seemingly fail to learn from previous lessons. As I’ve written before, two wrongs rarely make a right and their decision to ban ex-Evertonian Wayne Rooney for two games would appear to be a case of just that.
Only weeks ago the FA hid behind the excuse that referee Mark Clattenburg had ‘dealt’ with the issue of Rooney clearly elbowing James McCarthy when deciding not to ban him.
This week, if press reports are to be believed, they have pressured Lee Mason into giving a statement which legitimised giving the striker a two-mach ban.
The FA Respect campaign is worthy and was meant to take into account all aspects of respect; race, religion, gender, creed, disability etc.
Lately however it seems to have been sidetracked into an issue concerning solely referees.
Rooney’s inexplicable actions at Upton Park displayed a lack of respect to the worldwide audience.
Nevertheless for Lee Mason to say he would have sent Rooney off, giving the FA the excuse to ban him for two games, is nonsense. Referees regularly get sworn at directly, and I cannot recall a player being cautioned.
At a time when the respect campaign is coming increasingly into question, and Alex Ferguson is one of the most regular offenders, you can understand the FA wanting to reassert their objectives. But it should be done with a very public pronouncement of change, rather than a random ban on a player who is an easy target. Also you cannot help feeling that they have wrongly factored in his bad press which has nothing to do with what happened at Upton Park, and are completely out of their jurisdiction.
I have long expressed a desire for a strong FA, but they need to have the courage of their convictions.
