Friday May 2, 2008

Cardiff City & The Welsh Grey Areas

Cardiff City have obviously been big news recently having won through to the FA Cup final. There has been a drawn out saga of whether the club should be allowed to enter Europe next season if they actually win the cup. This has finally been resolved but it has been surprising to see so much negative reaction to the possibility coming from inside Wales itself.

This is worth examination as is the remarkable episode of Darren Purse and the overturning of his red card by the Welsh FA.

The situation regarding Cardiff's possible place in next seasons' UEFA Cup has been hard to understand. To myself, a complete neutral, it appeared only right and proper that if Cardiff qualified for Europe then they should take their place there. As members of the Football League it appeared logical that they should benefit from their achievements on the field just as any English club would.

Logic does not always take pride of place in the decision making process within football, however.

The first objections were raised from within our dear old FA. Apparently they believed Cardiff would not be eligible to take part in the UEFA Cup even if they managed to win the FA Cup because the club comes under the jurisdiction of the Welsh FA even though they play in the English league.

That seemed strange and totally unfair. Cardiff can't qualify for Europe through being a Welsh club because the Welsh FA don't allow them to take part in the Welsh Cup. Surely they should be able to qualify on the same terms as everyone else in the league they do take part in then?

UEFA immediately took the part of the club in saying that our FA should nominate them for a place in Europe if they won the FA Cup and suggested that they would find a place for them if the FA failed to do so.

The major voice from UEFA supporting The Bluebirds was, unsurprisingly, Michel Platini. Platini is becoming the Robin Hood, Zorro, Batman (and any other all round good guy you can think of) all rolled into one of modern football.

That arsehole from the Premier League tried to ridicule Platini by likening him to "a bloke in the pub" but all that did was make us "blokes in the pub" feel a whole lot better about ourselves. After all, Platini speaks nothing but common sense, obviously loves football and only wants what is best for the game.

But I digress.

The FA are getting used to saying things and immediately finding out from other people that what they've said was a little bit stupid. So they wouldn't have been too surprised to find out from UEFA that they really should be letting Cardiff represent them if they did win the cup and, after a reasonable delay to spare some of their blushes, they did an about turn and decided that Cardiff would be allowed to enter the UEFA Cup after all.

Providing they beat Portsmouth of course.

That, you would think, would have been the end of it. Not so. There were other dissenting voices about the possibility of Cardiif taking their place in Europe and these came from more surprising sources.

Welsh pride, it seemed, was also piqued at the prospect of Cardiff representing England in Europe. Alun Evans, a former big shot at the Welsh FA, reckoned that Cardiff would no longer be a Welsh club if they accepted a place in Europe by dint of success in an English competition while some supporters have also objected to the possibility, believing it to be a stain on their nationalism.

Of course you never know if the man in the street is a real Cardiff supporter or just some Welsh guy who wants to stir things up. It is not hard to believe that some Cardiff fans would prefer a statement of independence from their club rather than reap the full benefits of a potentially amazing achievement.

Cardiff City FC have already responded to the opinions of Evans in a withering manner and will obviously have no truck with any voices around the club suggesting they forego the glory and the financial rewards available if they do win the FA Cup.

Any patriotic Welshmen staunchly insisting that Cardiff would be committing a treason by playing in Europe are surely missing the point completely, however.

The gripe is that Cardiif would be representing England. Not really.

Attempts have been made to succour these objectors by suggesting that Cardiff would not be representing England, they would be representing the Football League. Not really.

If Cardiff City qualify for the UEFA Cup the only thing they'll be representing is Cardiff City.

The whole of England isn't rooting for our clubs when they play in Europe. In fact I would imagine over half the nation was spitting oaths when Manchester United knocked out Barcelona the other night, just as probably all Manchester United fans were cheering AC Milan on in last years' final against Liverpool.

Liverpool fans were probably reasonably cheerful when Fiorentina knocked Everton out of the UEFA Cup while Tottenham and Arsenal fans probably enjoyed watching the other team get knocked out just as much as they were gutted about their own teams' exits.

If Cardiff did get into Europe some English fans would want them to do well, others would be hoping to see them embarrass themselves. Just as is the case with every other team that makes it through into Europe.

Nobody at all, however, would start thinking of them as an English club.

I think it is also safe to assume that Johnny Foreigner knows enough about geography to realise that Cardiff is in Wales and would be thinking of them as a Welsh club if they did make it into the UEFA Cup.

Surely Cardiff's achievements already have provided a massive boost for Wales in general and if they were to qualify for Europe this would only be more beneficial.

Onto the second subject for discussion; Darren Purse's sending off against Burnley.

If you're not familiar with this then let me explain. Last Saturday Purse produced an ugly, over the top challenge on Andy Cole which ripped open the Burnley strikers' shin and earned the defender a totally deserved straight red card.

There were ugly recriminations afterwards from both sides which reflected no credit on either side but were at least understandable from the Burnley perspective.

The pathetic comments of Cardiff manager Dave Jones, who sought to blame Cole for the incident, and the hollow response of Purse himself would have been laughable except for the fact that they weren't actually funny.

The obvious agenda behind Cardiff's response was the fact that Purse's three match ban was going to rule him out of the FA Cup final.

Let's be fair, nobody likes seeing a player miss the biggest game of their life but, by the same token, nobody likes to see Andy Cole's shin ripped open. Ten stitches was the final count I believe.

Now Cardiff were so eager for Purse to be available to play at Wembley that they actually appealed against the red card.

What a daft thing to do. Everyone could see that it was a perfectly sound decision by the referee and all they were going to do was get Purse's ban increased.

After all, if Middlesbrough were frivolous in contesting Aliadiere's red card at Liverpool then Cardiff were just plain taking the piss here.

Ah, but not so quick there. Middlesbrough had to appeal to the English FA who were ever so quick in telling them where to go. Cardiff appealed Purse's dismissal to the Welsh FA who took about four seconds to consider their verdict before acquitting Purse completely, sending him a good luck message for the final along with a bunch of flowers to his mother.

Unbelievable.

This is what the Welsh FA actually said about the decision on their website

"A Disciplinary Panel met at the Football Association of Wales offices on Tuesday, 29th April 2008 to consider a Claim of Wrongful Dismissal for the sending-off for serious foul play of Darren Purse of Cardiff City FC in the Football League Championship match, Burnley FC v Cardiff City FC played on 26th April 2008.

Having carefully considered the written and DVD evidence submitted, the Panel decided that the 'Claim' be upheld and the three match standard punishment be withdrawn"

I repeat, unbelievable.

The Welsh FA, Darren Purse, David Jones and Cardiff City can ramble on all they want about this being justice but it is simply the biggest old pals act of all time and makes a mockery of absolutely everything that is right and moral to be honest.

There is no way on God's earth that the English FA would have retracted that ban so there is no way Cardiff should be able to get away with it by being goverened by a different body.

Everyone in the same league should play by the same rules and this needs to be cleared up immediately. In future all clubs playing in the English leagues should report to the same controlling body so that everyone can expect more or less the same treatment.

This decision was so biassed it positively stank.

And as for Purse's comment that "It was never intentional...just something that can happen in a game of football", that's all well and good but I think the general consensus within football was that Martin Taylor's challenge on Eduardo wasn't malicious.

You didn't see Birmingham and Taylor whining to the Welsh FA and getting the ban lifted though, did you?

I just hope Jones has the good grace not to complain next time someone goes over the top on one of his players and I can't help hoping that Purse has a real shocker at Wembley.