The bottom line is that you can't grab another player by the neck even if it's to defuse a tense situation and protect the player from harm, as was clearly the case in the Casemiro/Hughes incident. All that said, it's an offense that is sporadically enforced. In the very same incident a Palace player (think it was Ayew), actually attacked Fred's face and neck. The photos which have been published around the world leave no doubt about the more serious menacing intent and use of the hands to the face/neck by Ayew on Fred than Casemiro on Hughes by the collar (which is close enough for concern).
This cannot be excused away. One retired referee, Dermot Gallagher, explained away the discrimination on the grounds -- I'm not going to paraphrase it...let's see what he actually said, shall we?
But speaking to Sky Sports, Gallagher believes the referee made the right call and that they could not send off the Ghana international as well because there is only 'so much they can pick up at the time'.
Oh, so there's only "so much they can pick up at the time"? Has Dermot never heard of VAR? VAR exists to "pick up" that which the referee misses in real time, such as handball offenses, fouls in the box and offside offenses. And also suspected violent conduct. Yes of course referees miss things in real time, which is why we have VAR. With respect to violent conduct, we had video review that was used long before VAR existed to send off players who were guilty of violent conduct.
That's actually an insane quote from him.
Yeah, you used to get charged with violent conduct after games if it had been missed. If they all agree that Cas was correctly sent off then they should be charging Ayew.