By Kerry Harrison A lot of fans have expressed their opinion that Martin Atkinson favoured the home team in Sunday’s game at the Stadium of Light. Some are annoyed that the referee sent off Tiote. Others feel a sense of injustice that Seb Larsson did not suffer the same fate as the Newcastle midfielder. And then there are people who are baffled that not one Sunderland player received a yellow card. Now we’ve entered the period of calm after the storm, I give my opinion on Atkinson’s display… Tiote’s red card: Was it inevitable that the man who hadn’t sent anyone off in all league games this season would issue a straight red? There’s no doubt that Tiote’s tackle was a bad one. The question is; how bad? This all boils down to what defines a tackle – what is the difference between a yellow card and a red card. I must admit, I was not familiar with the rules at the time of the match so I did a little digging when I got home. The Guardian enlightened me to the following: “A careless foul is just a free kick; a reckless foul is a yellow; using excessive force which might endanger an opponent is a red.” So where does this definition leave us regarding the Tiote challenge? In my honest opinion I believe it was a yellow card. It was reckless, but I think ‘excessive force’ and ‘endangerment’ would be a harsh way to label it. There certainly was not any intent in the challenge either. However, whilst I think the tackle deserved a booking rather than a red card, I certainly do not believe Tiote was faultless in the incident. He committed a foul which was completely unnecessary. The whistle had already blown for a Newcastle free kick, had the midfielder not tackled Fletcher we wouldn’t even be debating this incident. Larsson’s challenge on Ameobi: Only a few minutes before Tiote was sent off, Larsson committed the following foul on Shola Ameobi: Martin Atkinson deemed this incident to be a foul – nothing more. This means he views it as a ‘careless’ challenge – that was not reckless, did not have excessive force or hold any endangerment to Ameobi. If I was to view this as an isolated incident I would say that, like Tiote’s challenge, in my opinion it’s worthy of a yellow card. However, the problem is that the referee deemed Tiote’s challenge a red. Therefore when viewing the foul in the context of the game this should be a sending off offence as well. If Cheick’s boot was high, reckless and dangerous then what was this? One Sunderland fan tried to tell me that the difference between the two is that Larsson’s studs weren’t in Ameobi’s chest and he made a genuine attempt for the ball, opposed to Tiote who simply wanted to take Fletcher out. I won’t even justify that with a response. Consistency In my opinion the problem with Martin Atkinson’s performance is not one or two isolated incidents, it was his overall performance. I felt there was a real lack of consistency throughout the game. I’ve highlighted these two tackles as a comparison. However, there were other offences by Sunderland players that went unpunished. For example, when Cuellar took out Demba Ba from behind – which was about one of five tackles the defender had made on the striker. Did it change the game? The fact that Sunderland equalised through a fluke goal would suggest not. The fact that Tiote could have remained on the pitch by not even making the challenge in the first place would suggest not. However, if Tiote and Larsson’s challenges were deemed equal then the teams would have been on a level playing field. The early indications suggest Newcastle could have quite easily gone on to win the game; after all they had more shots on target with 10 men than Sunderland did with 11. But whether that would have been the case we’ll never know. All in all, we just have to take it on the chin and look forward to round two at St. James’ Park! What do you think about Martin Atkinson’s performance? Did it change the game? Let us know your thoughts?
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