Sepp Blatter finally resigns, a few days too late!

Let me start by saying this.  I’m glad that Sepp Blatter finally found it within himself to do the honourable thing and step down as FIFA President.  But he should have done it Thursday, to save FIFA the embarrassment and humiliation of re-electing him to the top job there, only to then face another election process in quick succession.

But the whole debacle over the arrests and how FIFA responded to them, showed up the organisation as completely corrupt, and thinking themselves untouchable.  It showed up an organisation that had no transparency and no accountability to the people that ultimately pay their wages, the fans around the world who watch football, and play the FIFA branded video games.

In the aftermath of the arrests, the election should have been postponed, or at least Sepp Blatter should have announced that he was not going to stand for re-election.  He might have had a vision for Football, or Soccer as it’s known in some countries, but he had no vision when it came to the optics of the situation both he and FIFA were facing.

The optics were only made worse by Vladimir Putin offering his support to Blatter.  That should be a warning sign in itself.  If Putin offers you his support, turn it down.  It makes you look a hell of a lot worse.

Now he has stepped down and an emergency congress will elect a replacement, maybe we will actually start to see the change that is necessary in FIFA to bring it into the 21st century.  Maybe we’ll even see them take the decision to move the 2018 and 2022 World Cup venues due to the corruption allegations.  But progress in these sorts of matters is always slow, and I won’t hold my breath waiting for them.

Viewpoint Sports: Does being 'booked' actually mean anything?

I've been thinking about this for a while, during various times watching either live football or football highlights programmes.  You watch a player commit a foul, and the referee decides that the foul is serious enough to warrant a 'booking' as it is called.  So the referee calls the player over, produces a yellow card, and puts the player's name and/or number in a little black book that he carries.

Sorry, but what kind of penalty is that?  What does going in the referee's little black book actually mean?

Apparently, not much.  A yellow card is a 'caution' that is issued to the player concerned.  That's it, merely a caution.  In Rugby Union, a player that is yellow carded is sent to the 'Sin Bin', for 10 minutes, temporarily reducing the team by 1, which in other sports is sometimes refered to as a "Power Play".

On this day, there were 5 Premier League matches in England.  Between those 5 games, there were 17 yellow cards and 2 red cards.  Now one of those reds was a straight red card, and upon viewing the footage, even that seemed harsh.  The Scottish Premiership saw 2 matches today, one of which had no yellow or red cards, the other had 5 yellows and no reds.  7 top flight games in the UK, and between them all, 22 yellow cards and 2 red cards.

In the English Premier League today, one team, Southampton, had 5 yellow cards issued against them. That's almost half a team in the referee's book.  It's not as bad as an infamous match in the 2006 World Cup when Portugal and the Netherlands were issued 16 yellow cards between them and 4 players got yellow carded twice and got sent off. 

It seems that cautions mean nothing.  Maybe it is time to change what a yellow card actually means in Football. 

Now there are two possible options.  One is to make a yellow card mean the same as it does in Rugby Union, 10 minutes in a penalty box or sin bin for the player shown the card, temporarily reducing the team strength by 1.  Such a move would stop the cynical fouls that result in bookings that prevent what look to be potential goals.  It would also make players think twice before making silly challenges as your team being down a player for 10 minutes is more of a penalty, than a mere caution.  Upon a second yellow card, it would still become a red and a sending off for the duration of the game. 

The other, is to separate the yellow card and red card offences, in other words two yellows would not be an automatic red card, and have various penalties, probably various cards, for differing lengths of time in the 'Sin Bin'.  You could have three levels of penalty, worth 5 minutes, 10 minutes or 15 minutes depending on how serious the foul was, and the red card would still mean sending off. 

I like both thoughts, and to be honest, either one would have more of a deterrent effect than a mere caution. 

Mark Buehrle: The Perfect Game

The match: Tampa Bay Rays at Chicago White Sox.

The pitcher for the Sox: Mark Buehrle.

The Perfect Game: 27 Batters, 27 Outs, 0 Hits, 0 Walks, 0 Errors.

Sit back, relax and enjoy a moment of pure perfection.  All 27 outs, including extended highlights of the 25th out, the first in the 9th inning, which unquestionably saved the perfect game.

The coverage is from Comcast Sportsnet Chicago.  Your commentators are Ken Harrelson, Steve Stone & Bill Melton.

The final box score looked like this…

FINAL	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	Extra	Runs	Hits	Errors
Chicago White Sox	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	X	0	0	0
Tampa Bay Rays	0	4	0	0	1	0	0	0	X	X	5	6	0

 

Buehrle struck out 6 batters during his perfect game.  There have only been 18 perfect games in the history of Major League Baseball.  The previous one was pitched by Randy Johnson for the Arizona Diamondbacks back in 2004.  Congratulations to Mark Buehrle.  You’re in a very exclusive club now.