[drewks]

Well, MOTD highlighted it last night quite rightly IMO - they couldn't really ignore it though I guess.
I was hugely embarrassed by one of our own - Pocognoli - doing one of the more exaggerated, just to make it worse. Terrible, Poco      

WhyTF do players do this? What's the solution?
Personally I think if the refs aren't able to control it (and by all evidence they aren't - their consistency is non existent), managers/clubs should be punished retrospectively AS WELL AS players. It's a huge problem that's getting worse seemingly by the week; it's spoiling the game and needs to be dealt with urgently.  

[BaggieMan]

In fairness to Poco, although his 'fall' was spectacular, if you watch the incident carefully, he got up immediately he hit the ground all in one motion with no hint of any appeal for a penalty/free kick. Had he been trying to earn something, surely he would he not have writhed around somewhat and made some sort of appeal ?
Could it have been either a slip or went over anticipating being tackled?

[drewks]

In fairness to Poco, although his 'fall' was spectacular, if you watch the incident carefully, he got up immediately he hit the ground all in one motion with no hint of any appeal for a penalty/free kick. Had he been trying to earn something, surely he would he not have writhed around somewhat and made some sort of appeal ?
Could it have been either a slip or went over anticipating being tackled?

I'd really like to think so, but the look he gave as he acknowledged the booking suggests he bloody well tried to cheat. Yeh, he got up straight away but this is still cheating.
Not sure how you can go over 'anticipating being tackled'??! You're either tackled or you're not - if there's no contact there's no contact.

[talkSAFT]

I agree with you, Drewks. And I don't think that it's all that difficult for a ref to get confused at pitch level. You see a lot more at pitch level than up in the stands.
The problem's been around since Sky and the Johnny Foreigners brought the tricks over. (I'm not being UKIP, I'm saying how it is!!!)
Refs have had 20 years or so to really crack down, and they've made backward progress - same with set-piece wrestling, same with abusing the ref. If the refs declared war on the cheats and primadonnas from Day 1 - next week - Managers would have to get players to change their ways, or face half their team playing with yellow cards.
The crackdown should ALSO apply to the Big Clubs.

[Foxman_WBA]

My interpretation, poco had a moment of madness, saw the headlines ‘poco wins a penalty and wins the game’ and dived. Immediately realised what he’d done and got straight back up in order to try and avoid the booking. The ref’s saw this and booked him as they should have on the poco front case closed.

You cut diving out by booking the players that do! If it took there team down to 10 then players would stop. However as per the Cahill incident the ref’s are bottling it! They need to step up if they want to cut it out!

Another alternative is to introduce sin bins. I was looking at the hull game in particular and thinking it would be harsh to book or send off players mouthing off and disrespecting refs but if they immediately got sin bined it would bring more respect into the game and ref’s may feel less threatened to book players or make big decisions.

Just a thought.

[talkSAFT]

I definitely think Sin Bins would work, Foxman. It's a really good idea.
But I'm absolutely positive that refs bottle out of giving the same treatment to Top 4 Clubs that they give to Ordinary Clubs. They just bottle it, and I'd like to see the BBC give statistical evidence of this over (say) a season. I'm sure they could get one of their many "Experts" to study every game.
I know EVERY incident is different to another, but the "Expert" could grade each incident with certainty and uncertainty marks, and take account of ball possession statistics etc. I bet they'd find that Chelsea and ManU have embarassingly got away with murder. And offending refs could be brought to justice by the League if their stats were consistently seen as "dodgy".

[drewks]

Interesting points.
DEFINITELY agree with Sin Bins, and even more so with the fact that the refs are simply bottling it, more often with players from the big clubs.

Sin Bins are a good idea - work great in RU, but I also think that retrospective punishment should be allowed after the game to combat CHEATING of all kinds. If the player and the club (or HC/Manager) were punished it would stop instantly.

Would this sort of change have to be sanctioned by FIFA or could it just be a Premier League experiment? NO CHANCE if Sepptic Bladder and the rest of his crooked colleagues had to agree to a change
Not sure how this sort of thing works