If you wanted to see an example of everything that’s wrong with the modern bureaucracy that dominates English football, take today’s ruling on the above “pic of the week”. It depicts an absolute nightmare of a challenge by Wigan’s Callum McManaman on Newcastle’s Massadio Haïdara midway through the first half of their match up on Saturday, which somehow produced zero cards. The tackle, seen here in its full glory, was described as “clean as a whistle” by the completely unbiased Lattics chairman Dave Whelan.

So why does this one image capture all that is wrong with the FA? Today, the FA announced that no retrospective punishment will be handed out to McManaman. Their official statement: “Where one of the officials has seen a coming together of players, no retrospective action should be taken, regardless of whether he or she witnessed the full or particular nature of the challenge. This is to avoid the re-refereeing of incidents.” 

Huh… it’s like the FA are admitting their referees are blind idiots, since this is most definitely a red card offense. And if that’s the case, so are they.