Crybabies in Qatar

Crybabies surrounding the refereeWhatever happened to the rule where only the captain is allowed to talk to the referee? Now players fly from across the field to deliver the amazing news to the referee that they don’t think that their teammate committed a foul and that the referee should reconsider and retract the call. Which never happens. But they all line up to tell him anyway. It’s tedious and childish.

A friend clarified for me,

“the point is not to argue that call, its to encourage the ref to reconsider a future decision on the next call or calls. they are setting the tone, and the ref either stops it or lets it go on. if your captain is the gk is it reasonable to expect him to run to the other end of the field to complain a call? no. and until refs enforce it then players will and should continue to do it. in footballing terms this is called “shithousery””

I appreciate the clarification. But I wasn’t confused as to why they do it. The point about the captain not being close enough is well-taken, but that possibility doesn’t justify everyone playing “captain”. I don’t care much either way because I only watch occasionally and can easily walk away (I’m a dilettante!). I feel bad for people who are stuck watching these antics without even realizing how far away from actual soccer it’s gotten. That Overton Window is a sonofabitch.

The world is full of terrible incentives. This is just another of those. I suppose it’s just my way of complaining every 2-4 years about how soccer is sometimes more about shithousery than anything else. It’s not an honorable sport at that level. It’s all about lying and manipulating for advantage when there’s no other way to get it.

Still, I wonder how much influence shithousery actually has on a professional referee. Do we put up with watching these antics even though it has no effect on the game at all? My friend said that “the referee can end it; they just don’t”, so is this a deliberate WWE-ification/twitterification of the game?

Perhaps it’s deliberately allowed because a lot of people enjoy drama. If there were less drama, fewer people would watch. Fans of the actual sport have to watch it be diluted so that it will attract the interest of people who are fans of drama, but don’t care much about what’s going on between dramatic scenes. They could just as well be watching any other reality show, or browsing TikTok. This mindset poisons the game.[1]

I wonder why this sort of drama hasn’t infected ice hockey or NFL football yet? There, it’s the opposite: players are expected to play through the pain and injury, which is wrong, but in another way.