The Right Spirit

The Right Spirit

One of the features of modern football which exasperates me is the culture of diving which has become endemic. There were always players who went down too easily but it has grown in recent decades to become an almost accepted part of the game. In professional sport the prizes for success and the price of failure mean that some players will seek any advantage they can to succeed. Sportsmanship does still exist and even in highly competitive situations you can still find people prepared to play the game in the right spirit.

Celtic’s former chairman Bon Kelly was always very concerned about the club being seen to be sporting and playing the game in the right manner. Sean Fallon recalled being given a win bonus for a match they lost and being told it was because of the manner in which they played the game. Kelly would also tell the players to respect their opponents and accept the Referee’s decisions without complaint. When Jock Stein took over in 1965 he was adamant that he would run team affairs and the notoriously interfering Kelly should stay out of that side of the club. In one of his first big tests, the League Cup Final with Rangers in 1965 he did allow Kelly to address the team. The Chairman told the team to respect their opponents, play fair and remember they were representing Celtic. The pragmatic Stein waited till Kelly had left the dressing room and turned to his team saying, ‘You can forget that crap right now. We’ve been bullied for too long in these games. You let your opponent know he’s in a game from the first tackle.’ Stein wasn’t asking his players to cheat but merely to stop being soft touches. Celtic won the cup that day after a display which combined good football with a more streetwise attitude.

Some of the best examples of sportsmanship over the years have come in moments when players could easily have taken advantage of opponents. You may recall Everton Keeper Paul Gerrard lying injured in the box as a cross came towards West Ham’s Paolo Di Canio; the Italian could have headed for the empty goal but instead caught the ball in order to allow the injured keeper treatment. There was the famous incident in golf’s Ryder cup between Tony Jacklyn and Jack Nicklaus with the score tied and the players level on the last hole of the last round, Nicklaus holed for a par leaving Jacklyn a 3 foot put to ties the tournament. There was huge pressure on Jacklyn not to miss and as he prepared for the crucial put. Instead of making his opponent play the shot, Nicklaus picked up the ball saying, ‘I don’t think you’d have missed it Tony but I didn’t want to give you the chance.’ At such a decisive moment in the tie and indeed the whole competition is was a remarkable act of sportsmanship.

The essence of sport is in fair an honest competition and the Olympics in particular tries to promote these values. In the 1936 games held in Hitler’s Berlin, long jumper Lutz Long was up against Jessie Owens the remarkable American athlete. The American foot faulted twice and was set to be eliminated from the competition if he did so for a third time when his German opponent coached him on how to adjust his run up and not fault. Owens took his advice and qualified for the final. He won the gold medal and Long the silver and the two opponents walked arm in arm around the track laughing and joking together; a fairly symbolic act in a racially tense country at the time. Owens said years later…

"You can melt down all the medals and cups I have," said Owens and they wouldn't be plating on the twenty-four carat friendship that I felt for Luz Long at that moment."

Lutz Long was killed in Sicily fighting for Germany in 1943 and is buried there. Owens never forgot him and travelled to Germany after the war to meet Long’s family. They became friends and Owens was best man at Lutz Long’s son’s wedding.

In football, Robbie Fowler of Liverpool was awarded a penalty against Arsenal and to the surprise of everyone in the stadium told the referee these was no contact and he simply slipped. The penalty was rescinded. Such things are rarer these days with many forwards more likely to simulate in a shameless manner and take whatever the referee gives. We see it at every level of football and as youngsters seek to emulate their heroes and I was disappointed to see it in a schoolboy game I watched at the local park.  

One of the features of the recent Women’s World Cup was the much reduced level of simulation in games. It was quite refreshing to watch players compete without much cheating going on. You do get some Managers who will defend their players no matter what. Arsene Wenger was famous for ‘not seeing’ incidents when his players dived or claiming they were ‘avoiding injury’ by jumping out of the way. He’s no mug, he’s simply not one to criticise his players in public.

There will always be cheats in football and to be honest no club can claim to be free from it. Some are more blatant about it and seem to base a lot of their game on going down at the slightest opportunity. PSG’s Neymar rubs a lot of people up the wrong way with his antics while closer to home Kyle Lafferty seems to simulate at every opportunity. The incident where he got Charlie Mulgrew of Aberdeen sent off was a classic example as was Scott Brown’s yellow card when Lafferty rolls about holding his shin when there was clearly no contact. They’re not alone in this behaviour by any means and if it’s ever going to be stamped out (no pun intended) or at least reduced then referees need to issue a yellow card for every clear incidence of it. It should also be dealt with by the compliance officer when appropriate.

As the new season gets underway, I hope it’s remembered for good football, great goals and moments of skill not for controversy over simulation and inept responses to it from officials and the SFA. It’s a part of the game I don’t like and it has in my time watching football gone from a niggling rarity to a fairly common part of the game. Maybe I’m being old fashioned but I’d like to see football clean up its act and games decided on skill, effort and merit not on decisions conned out of referees.