Saka hasn’t just let his leg dangle, he literally jumps and sticks his leg out to make sure there’s contact, he has even put himself on the wrong side of the ball by doing so…. If his intention was to go past Neuer then there’s no reason to do either of those, he’d just step to the left when he plays the ball past him, like most players do when they try to get past someone. Maybe he expects Neuer to come in faster and that there’s going to be a collision so he backs out to avoid risk of injury, but it definetely isn’t a penalty.
Saka (Arsenal)
- Thread starter golden_blunder
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Saka hasn’t just let his leg dangle, he literally jumps and sticks his leg out to make sure there’s contact, he has even put himself on the wrong side of the ball by doing so…. If his intention was to go past Neuer then there’s no reason to do either of those, he’d just step to the left when he plays the ball past him, like most players do when they try to get past someone. Maybe he expects Neuer to come in faster and that there’s going to be a collision so he backs out to avoid risk of injury, but it definetely isn’t a penalty.
Nice dive by Saka.
That’s an Ashley Young’esque dive. Elite.
Christ if only the referees has half the sense in our league. Liverpool one would have been overturned for certain for instance (it was a fecking dive, so was Sakas)
Neuer stuck his leg out to trip him, so it's a pen. Saka exaggerating the fall is secondary. There was certainly enough to make him go down.
Neuer literally planted his foot as soon as he saw Saka wasn’t taking the shot.
It was a blatant dive.
Mad how football can still be so subjective
I think so as well. Although I would be fuming if this happened to us and no penalty is given.
Its a pen. Even if Saka had entirely evaded him to take the shot, it would have thrown him out of balance.
Saka was rounding the keeper, and neuer stuck his leg out to stop him. He made clear contact and it was enough to bring him down. I agree the fall was exaggerated, but that's secondary to the obvious fact that it's a penalty.
Doesn't necessarily mean thats a penalty though imo. He'd regain the balance fairly quickly and still have a chance to shoot.
It wasn't Neuer who initiated the contact.
If you're making unnatural contact and bringing a player down its a foul though. It's that simple.
It was both. Initially I felt clear dive but a replay clearly shows neuer stuck his leg out wide to being Saka down.
The contact was made because Saka trailed his leg out to make that contact. It’s really not subtle at all, the angle behind him told the whole story, which is what the ref saw in real time.
I’m not sure why you are dying on this hill when even AFTV and Ian Wright said it’s not a pen, would be a travesty if it was given.
This trailed his leg out argument is quite a lot of bollocks to be honest. I'm not saying he wasn't looking for a penalty with the fashion of how he fell, but neuer literally sticking his leg out unnaturally to bring him down is a much bigger deal. That's the primary, and Sakas legs were not unnatural, he was cutting left to run, he got caught and it was enough to bring him down.
This AFTV and Ian wright argument is also weird. If you heard commentary, Rio and Keown said its a clear foul, and the pair of them are center backs. What's your point?
It’s a foul imo. The keeper has to be clever and not give a reason for the ref to give it.
Don't know why it's even a surprise. He's another who is on the floor waving his arms around at the ref evey angle time he loses possession. It's pretty much an involuntary natural reaction at this point.
Uts cost them a goal there and I thought it cost England in the last world cup too, because the ref might have given the freekick on him in the build up to France's goal if it wasn't already them umpteenth time he'd flung himself onto the ground.
Cheating doesn't always help you if you just do it out of habit ala Raheem Sterling/Bruno/etc. rather than have a brain to go with it.
Ronaldo and Kane are both terrible cheats for example but there's no way either are hitting the deck when the alternative is a potential open goal.
Uts cost them a goal there and I thought it cost England in the last world cup too, because the ref might have given the freekick on him in the build up to France's goal if it wasn't already them umpteenth time he'd flung himself onto the ground.
Cheating doesn't always help you if you just do it out of habit ala Raheem Sterling/Bruno/etc. rather than have a brain to go with it.
Ronaldo and Kane are both terrible cheats for example but there's no way either are hitting the deck when the alternative is a potential open goal.
He stuck his leg but Saka clearly went from his way to make a contact with it.
The fecker kicks the keeper. How is this debatable?
Can't get on board with this at all. Slow mo can make things look worse but it's just so blatant that Saka sticks his leg into Neuer rather than vice versa.
Sometimes you see players kick the ball out of a keeper's path and go over/into them just to win a penalty, which I think you can argue is on the keeper for being wreckless, but Saka has both kicked the ball away and moved part of his body into the path of the keeper. You can't be giving penalties for nonsense like that.
Saka didn't go from his way to make contact. He was already trying to cut in that direction to round the keeper.
Again, I'm not denying saka exaggerated the foul, but it was certainly a foul. I think even Harry Kane said it was a penalty
For me, it's very obvious Neuer sticks his leg out to clip saka. That is actually more clear in the replay than saka dangling a leg (both happened).
One thing that's clear is that Saka is not simply trying to go around the keeper to score. He is actively trying to force the contact, which makes it look really fake, both in real time and in slow motion.
Neuer stops and he throws his leg out to make contact. Entirely different situation to AWB and Elliott, had Neuer got flying in you'd say penalty, but he's stopped and knows he's not getting near the ball.
I think the referee got that one right, Saka could have avoided all contact and still got the ball and a shot away, instead he took the easy option and went looking for a pen.
I think the referee got that one right, Saka could have avoided all contact and still got the ball and a shot away, instead he took the easy option and went looking for a pen.
Most bizarre thing about it was he should have just scored. He was round the keeper and had an empty net.
Less on a pen than the handball
Agreed. Saka gets an easy ride from the media as he's an England darling after the Euro 2020 penalty shootout miss abuse stuff. I don't watch too much of Arsenal in fairness, but every time I see him play, I see him diving in a way which would have the likes of Bruno crucified by the press.
Don't see it. Just watched it back again. Neuer plants his foot...looks like he's expecting Saka to go to his left. He doesn't actually commit to a challenge at any point. Saka is the one who initiates it.
If Neuer's leg is in Saka's natural path then I think there's a case but the fact Saka has to so blatantly dangle his leg there takes that argument away.
If you give Saka a massive benefit of the doubt you could argue he realised he was off balance when he cut inside to go past Neuer, but that doesn't make it a foul it just means Saka wasn't in full control and would have lost possession.
I think he's the worst in the league for it since Kane left. Although Bruno comfortably outdoes him in the overall whiney cheat stakes as Saka's cheating/complaining is limited to when he loses possession.
Its annoying as I think he'd actually be a better player if he ditched it or even was a bit smarter with it...can't really single out someone just for diving alone anymore as literally any forward will do it when they think it will benefit them. Saka is easily skillful and good enough to pick his moments rather than go with the Sterling tactic of acting like he's diving to compensate for not being good enough to beat his man and create something.
how can we blame someone for doing these antics when it’s basically how VAR works? These players just do what they can to get a pen within the framework of what VAR and refs call a pen.
If we don’t want dives, then move the threshold up and punish players for sticking their legs out to make a dive look natural. The issue is the overall line - refs and VAR imo.
… you could also just scrap VAR, which would probably just be better
If we don’t want dives, then move the threshold up and punish players for sticking their legs out to make a dive look natural. The issue is the overall line - refs and VAR imo.
… you could also just scrap VAR, which would probably just be better
I think you have to visualise just how unnatural Saka’s leg position is when he makes contact. You can buy contact (as sad as that is) but you can see he has no intention of coming inside because he essentially just lets his leg fly forward to get the hit. I’m completely ok with that not being a penalty and hopefully it deters players.
At the end of the day I feel the right call was made. So everyone should move on. It's splitting hairs because the contact, definition of contact for a penalty and the players that use this to their advantage taking into consideration woeful refereeing decisions to compare to.
The beautiful thing is now we have a great game to look forward to in Germany where I'm positive the referee in charge will be shitting themselves.
But as an Arsenal fan who would like the same respect Saka had eyes for the pen and it wasn't given (Rightfully imho) when it easily could have been.
The beautiful thing is now we have a great game to look forward to in Germany where I'm positive the referee in charge will be shitting themselves.
But as an Arsenal fan who would like the same respect Saka had eyes for the pen and it wasn't given (Rightfully imho) when it easily could have been.
It's a curious one. Assuming you're not just being biased for whatever reason I think it depends entirely on who you focus on. If you focus on Neur you can see he moves his leg into Saka's path but if you focus on Saka it looks like he throws his leg into Neur deliberately. So yeah I think both things are true in this instance.
Saka held his leg out for 2-3 business days, clearly hoping to make contact with Neuer to win a pen.
Was the right call by the ref.
Was the right call by the ref.
He’s always been a diving little cnut.
There was an opportunity to win a penalty there. He just fecked it up.
If Johnny Non-English did that for a Non-English club against an English club, there would be a huge media smear campaign discrediting the player as a blatant cheat.
Hadn't seen this until today. Can't quite believe he went down, he's gone around him and will almost certainly score. Reminds me of grealish on pretty much every dribble - he goes down even when more beneficial to keep going. If that was a United player I'd be absolutely livid at them
Yep I agree with another poster earlier ij the thread. If he keeps that leg low, it would have looked far more natural and I reckon it would be given.