04 June 2023 , 08:35
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The Premier League, apparently, was “shocked and appalled by the unacceptable abuse” directed at Anthony Taylor and his family at Budapest Airport last week.
No wonder. Any right-minded individual would have felt likewise.
But can you remember the Premier League being “shocked and appalled” when Jurgen Klopp screamed in the face of fourth official John Brooks and effectively accused referee Paul Tierney of having an agenda against Liverpool?
Can you remember the Premier League being “shocked and appalled” when Pep Guardiola laid his hands on an assistant referee during Manchester City’s game at Brighton recently and gave referee Simon Hooper pelters?
Can you remember the Premier League being “shocked and appalled” when serial offender Marco Silva, according to an FA verdict, aimed a torrent of “abusive and insulting words and gestures towards the match referee (Chris Kavanagh)” during Fulham’s FA Cup quarter-final tie at Old Trafford?
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Can you remember the Premier League being “shocked and appalled” following a match between Fulham and Brighton in March, after which Roberto de Zerbi admitted “his behaviour and/or language in the tunnel afterwards towards a match official was abusive and/or insulting and/or improper”?
Taylor was accosted by fans at the airport (Twitter)
The English referee was with his family during the incident (Twitter)Can you remember the Premier League being “shocked and appalled” when one of its poster players, Declan Rice - after a West Ham game against Eintracht Frankfurt in last year’s Europa League semi-finals - asked Spanish referee Jesus Gil Manzano “how can you be that bad?” and then suggested the official had “probably been f****** paid”?
Nope, me neither.
The Premier League is absolutely right to highlight and condemn the abuse, physical and verbal, sustained by Taylor and his family by the idiotic Roma fans in Hungary.
Absolutely right. But it is easy to be “shocked and appalled” by these morons posing as fans, easy to express revulsion at those sorts of horrible incidents.
The Premier League are often slow to condemn the bad behaviour in this country (Javier Garcia/REX/Shutterstock)But where is the Premier League condemnation of Jose Mourinho for the “unacceptable abuse” he directed at Taylor in a car park beneath the stadium? Nowhere to be seen or heard.
Where is the Premier League condemnation of the Roma and Sevilla players who persistently tried to intimidate Taylor during the match? Nowhere to be seen or heard.
And that is why the abuse of officials by managers and players will continue unchecked - because too many stakeholders refuse to condemn their own.
In charge of all disciplinary matters, it is left to the Football Association to deal with managers and players who misbehave but the situation would be helped by some sort of initiatives from other involved organisations.
But the League Managers Association will never censure their own, the Professional Footballers Association will not admit to a problem of dissent and disrespect from players, and the Premier League is concerned only about its ‘product’ - the self-proclaimed best in football.
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The antics from Mourinho, the Roma bench, the Sevilla bench, the Roma players and the Sevilla players during the Europa League final were hideous.
But don’t let’s pretend there is no problem on these shores, because there most certainly is.
But only when the likes of the Premier League become “shocked and appalled” by what happens on their watch, will things get any better.