Arsenal...oh dear. Pretty much a full-strength side too. Still, it's only a cup match, and the Gunners are still very much in the running for fourth. I do have to say though, if Arsenal finish outside the CL spots I expect that heads will roll.
What's worse than playing without Suarez? Playing with Gervinho.
Ah, how is Geert these days? He still looks like the villain from a James Bond film.... I assumed that the "immigrant" angle with the Moroccans was just a sideshow that the press were playing up to sell papers. Thanks for the links.
Sad to say Gert is still with us, his party was heavily defeated in the elections in September, but he remains a vocal heckler, he always knows whats wrong, but cannot think of a way to fix it
Just an up date on the major problems in Dutch amateur football.
Well the discussion about how to clean up Dutch amateur football has begun.
First off the back ground to this problem is far in history, this goes back well before the second world war. Violence both on and off the field has been tolerated for far to long. Amateur football has always had a special place in Dutch society, the amateur teams were set up via Regional, Religious, Political ties, the matches became far more than mere football games. My own father was arrested in 1934 at a match here in 's-Hertogenbosch for hitting another player, oh and by the way my father was a Doctor.
When pro football came to the Netherlands in the 1950's this was organized properly via FIFA/UEFA rules.
The sheer size of the amateur game in the Netherlands has been it's problem from the start. On any given weekend 32,000 games from a population of 16,000,000. The numbers of KNVB match officials was never enough to cover all these matches, so as stopgap solution it was decided that at the lower end of the youth game the home team would supply the linesmen, and even sometimes the referees. This was never seen as ideal but there was never enough manpower to rectify the problem, the KNVB could not spare enough time to train them, and these people were volunteers, and we all know there are never enough of those.
With all the resources going to the Top Class A, B and C matches, the games played in the lower classes suffered from a very poor standard of refereeing. It was a open joke about playing against the twelfth man. From my own past I played in a game in 1967, when there was a very bad off side decision given against us. The team got in a fight about it on the pitch, the linesman hit just about everybody with is flag baton. Somebody shouted call the police, and the linesman shouted back I'm already here.
Another aspect that has altered are the parents of the children, most are supportive and a few can be a bit fanatical, but this is nothing new. What is new are parents who see their children as a meal ticket to big time football clubs. Two years ago here in my home town an assistant trainer was attacked and put in hospital by such a parent, this happened off the pitch so only made the local news.
These are the first ideas to come out of the discussion.
The act of attacking somebody on the field of play, will from now on be an automatic criminal offense. Which can see you get a prison sentence of two years.
Every amateur team in the Netherlands is now committed to raising the standard of match officials.
The active coaching of both problem players and the parents is now the club's responsibility
I do hope that there are not to many mistakes, and that it is readable.
