[Dirtycheat]

Dangerous tacklers are criminals and should be prosecuted, insists Blatter

FIFA president also says homosexuality 'more popular' in women's football

Originally Posted by Daily mail/ times

FIFA president Sepp Blatter has called for a major clampdown on players guilty of dangerous tackles - and the managers who encourage them.

Blatter believes reckless challenges are one of the biggest scourges of the modern game and insists there should be harsh penalties for the perpetrators, including criminal charges where necessary.

"Dangerous tackling is one of the most important issues in football at the moment," Blatter told The Times.

"Players who do this kind of thing intentionally should be banned from the game."

He added: "Attacking somebody is criminal, whether it happens on a football pitch or elsewhere. It is a crime and should be treated as such."

Blatter, who is to push for tougher refereeing ahead of Euro 2008, insists managers are often as guilty as the players who dive into challenges.

"The mechanism where this happens today is obvious," he said. "The pressure on the coach or manager to win is such that he encourages his players to go for victory at any cost.

"There is no microphone in the dressing-room, so he says, 'go, go, go'. Until when? Until the point where the referee intervenes."

Blatter also reiterated his opposition to the Premier League's floundering plan for a 39th game, insisting he would not soften his stance.

"It is impossible that they can persuade me of this," he said. "They cannot do it.

"It is not only me who is against this, it is others, too. I represent the family of football and I will bring this to the Congress of Fifa if necessary."

The FIFA president also spoke about the seeming absence of gay footballers from the game.

"There are gay footballers, but they don't declare it because they think it will not be accepted in these macho organisations," he said.

"But football is open for everybody, which is why they made a gay competition in South America. And look at women's football: homosexuality is more popular there."

this man has totally lost it, he is really trying his best to destroy the beautiful game.

I think the current suspensions each league hand to offenders is more than enough. Nobody gets away with it as such and if it is serious they can get bans that stretch over months and sometimes legal action is taken against them.

What blatter is proposing is probably meant in a good way but i personally dont agree in banning someone for life for one bad challenge. Sometimes injuries can make challenges look much worse than they are and sometimes they look much worse in replays than in real time.

i think being tough is one thing but inviting lawyers into this and banning players for life is another. It might be a good deterrent but it will really discourage anyone from tackling unless they are 150% sure they will get the ball and only the ball.

here is what keane had to say

Originally Posted by Daily mail

Speaking ahead of his side's Barclays Premier League game against Everton on Sunday, Keane said: "I have to be careful with this subject. I would have been doing a bit of 'porridge' myself!

"People in the media have been saying some of the tackles have been horrendous.

"I've heard before that if it happened in the street then you might be charged with assault.

"I know there's been one or two court cases over the years. You're opening a can of worms there - I think you'd have to be very careful."

One of Keane's players was on the receiving end of a horrible challenge back in December when Aston Villa's Craig Gardner escaped unpunished despite planting his studs into the chest of Dwight Yorke.

But Keane said: "As bad as that tackle was on Yorkie that day, Yorkie was OK. Luckily, Yorkie's not nasty enough to seek revenge I suppose.

"It's very hard to gauge what's going on in the game because the game is that fast now. It's trying to gauge what players mean and what's accidental."

I would have gone to prison as a player under Sepp's proposal, says Keane | the Daily Mail

IMO someone better tell blatter that wenger only said this in the spur of the moment and later retracted his comments.

so, what do you think on the issue?

[funkdoctorspock]

In general, I'm really starting to think that Blatter should resign. His ideas are no better than a 10 year old at best and he's getting paid to say it. Which is just sad.

On the issue at hand. Its daft. 9 times out of 10, these types of injuries are without malice and intent. How is a court going to determine whether a tackle was intentional?

Specifically regarding the Eduardo injury, since this is what Blatter is rambling on about. The injury was severe, Taylor stated it was without malice and you could tell right after the injury that his reactions backed up his words.

I feel terrible for Eduardo and I really hope that he has a speedy recovery and continues his footballing at a high level.

I'm thinking severe fines and lengthy bans. As long as footballers are reminded that there living might be reduced if they intentionally go out and try to injure other players. That will be more than enough.

How about a wages transfer? If you injure a player and it is deemed intentional. From the time the player is out with the injury until the time the player returns. The offending player has to pay out 60% of there weekly wages.

[Torque]

Yep, i agree with you two: a person cannot tell if a tackle was intentional or not. Blatter found a way to read people's minds? Really that is stupid.

Fines and bans are more than enough. For repeated hard challenges they could come out with a solution to punish the offender.

Nowadays the game is so fast so I'm not surprised there are this kind of tackles, most of them are late ones.

But to go to prison? I mean really, are we in a prehistorical era?

[cbud003]

Sepp Blatter is a complete asshole. His views on malacious intent is completely out of whack. I don't think there should be harsher penalties for malicious intent. There's no reason for the government, police and Fifa to intervene and say that a guy should be arrested for a rough tackle.