Special Feature: Quotes of the week (Nov 8th-12th) - Part 1
As the week toils towards yet another round of the English Premier League matches, it is quite crucial that managers and their words should be kept under the light. Harry Redknapp made the headlines a week earlier for absolutely going on a rampage against
Mark Clattenburg and his mysterious decision during Tottenham’s match in the Premier League against Tottenham Hotspurs. Redknapp wasn’t best pleased back then with referee Clattenburg’s decision that allowed United to sneak in a goal after Luis Nani’s hand
ball inside the Spurs’ penalty area.
After the match against United, Harry came out and labelled the decision as the worst ever in the history of football. Not only that he also threatened to go on a media strike if the F.A took action against him for voicing his opinion on the whole decision/refereeing
matter. So after all this hoopla with Spurs losing against United by two goals to nil, Redknapp’s team lost on the following weekend to Bolton before drawing with Sunderland in mid-week. Harry came out after his team’s draw against Sunderland at the White
Hart Lane and went into a temporary mother Teresa role as he said, "I've never been one for criticizing referees; it's never been my game”
Building on this framework and introduction of everyday refereeing problems, Tony Pulis had also come out previously and blamed referees for his side’s winless streak in the Premier League. However, in mid-week Stoke bested a determined Birmingham side by
three goals to two at the Britannia stadium, Pulis was in a jolly good mood as he said, "You go into games and referees are going to make mistakes, like players do, like every one of us in this room will do. You just hope they don't make game-changing mistakes.
I have just seen the television replay. I never see the referee, but I will go to see him today”. Of course little elaboration is required after this remark as Stoke won the game courtesy of a slightly curious officiating decision during their encounter with
Birmingham City.
Tony Pulis added fuel to the fire as he went onto say, “We've had decisions that have been absolutely abysmal but we have kept our grace and just got on with things. We know we are not going to get certain decisions that other clubs are going to get. I think
that has been made blatantly obvious over the past few games, but there comes a point where you have to stand up and say 'this is not right'. The last thing I want to do is to be sitting here the day before a game talking about referees but I have to say the
treatment this football club has had with respect to the decisions has been appalling". And now the Punch line from the master manager Tony, "I thought (referee) Mark Clattenburg was very good tonight - and if he's missed that, then I'm very pleased!"
Sir Alex Ferguson usually has a bone to pick with referees as well but he lets that part take a secondary priority as the Scottish manager rants about Manchester City’s cheap marketing flicks. Ferguson spoke before his team’s nil all draw with City as he
said about the ‘Welcome to Manchester poster’, "I don't know how it was created, probably some advertising gimmick at City. But I don't think they can be proud of it. I said it was stupid at the time. They probably think that now. I don't see how they thought
it would get more points off us when it came to playing on a football pitch. Maybe it was worthwhile for some of the supporters but I think a lot of them were embarrassed. They would rather see that trophy being paraded through the city before they start screaming
from the rooftops".
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