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Sunday, August 19, 2007

Looks like Styles got it wrong this time, but Gray is worse

I can understand why he did it (and as a Chelsea supporter I'm quite glad he did) but it looks as though Rob Styles was duped by the ball when he awarded Chelsea a penalty at Anfield this afternoon.
Styles, standing outside the penalty area, saw the ball slid towards Florent Malouda in the penalty area and he saw Malouda blocked by a Liverpool defender and prevented from reaching the ball. In fact the ball was about a foot behind Malouda and out of his reach. There was also a decided possibility that Maliuda jumped into the defender.
So not the best decisions from Styles in a bad-tempered match featuring 8 bookings.
However Sky TV's Andy Gray reverted to type with an ill-informed diatribe condemning Styles and virtually accusing him of cheating by refusing to give Chelsea any decisions because of the penalty. Gray can be a keen observer of the game when he chooses to, but is at his weakest when he listens to the voices that tell him the best way to secure ratings is to ignore the football and concentrate on assassinating the officials.

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