Kenny Dalglish Won't Be Delivering the Module: English Premiership 2011-12

'11/'12 season notable so far only for the discovery that Veetle works on my phone.

gervinho's a diving cunt. ryan taylor never touched him...

nah he didn't dive... his forehead just got too heavy...

This may be stating the completely blindingly obvious but no one who's played today is getting anywhere near the title.

bitter Spurs fan ruling us out already

only got one song (unless he gets sent off)

dunno why Theo wasn't on from the beginning, no surprises seeing Arshavin so lazily impotent.

I like Song a bit more after that Barton stamp.

How about the new boy?

wtf?

That's some bullshit.

OH FUCK OFF

gervinho gets started on: gets a red.

OH FUCK YOU ONLY A FUCKING YELLOW WHAT IS FUCKING WRONG WITH YOU

can't wait for Barton to sign for Arsenal in a couple of days now.

Much more simulation from Barton than Gervinho there.

oh shit joey barton gets touched, goes down like he's shot

The ref's been reading his Twitter. He likes the Field Mice, there's no way he could be involved in any trouble.

No one's signing Barton now, he's waiting out his contract at Newcastle.

Those decisions were all correct, although Barton is a terrible person

two games at st james park - two unjust sending offs for joey being a dick.

how does barton not get a red for that?

he's just picked a man up and shouted at him cos he done a dive ain't he

he manhandled him and pushed him about - i've seen reds for a lot less

With Mp4xA, gervinho raises his hands therefore needs to go, Barton probably guilty of Ungentlemanly Conduct in pulling him up so yellow?

he pulled him up pretty violently and was getting well into it, isn't there a rule for provocation?

what arsenal have lacked in continuity inside the box, they have up for it with interesting hairstyles

two games at st james park - two unjust sending offs for joey being a dick

Oh come on, you'll be telling us that's why it ended 4-4 next.

Yanked him by the collar too violently to be just 'ungentlemanly conduct' for me.

Yeah, going on a (possibly imagined) distinction between grabbing a guy above or below the neck - without anyone going nucular and touching the face there that gets dismissed as "handbags" and the ref gets praised for having common sense and not being tempted to send anyone off. Barton aggravating it and being an obvious dick complicates it and makes it seem unfair, but enh

Happy to be blown away by Caek Referee Veracity when the time comes though

The greatest trick Joey Barton ever pulled was distracting everyone from the fact he's been awful as an actual player today.

Barton will definitely give a perplexed, faux-angelic post match interview, if Newcastle let him

Barton's scowling Bickle face on the MOTD big screen as Shearer disapprovingly says "Jooey's a very lookee boy thur"

I dunno, none of it would have happened if he didn't PICK THE GUY UP TO FUCK WITH HIM. That isn't just handbags imo.

Our backline, keeper, Song, Rosicky and Gervinho been v good today, the rest have been gash and unfortunately the rest is where games are won. Wilshere and Theo for Ramsey and Arshavin and we will look a hell of a lot better. Gibbs's crossing in this one game >>> Clichy's Arsenal crossing career.

just discovered that theo walcott has the same number of club goals as his predecessor franny jeffers (36, fwiw)

imo should have been three red cards: Song, then Barton and Gervinho

Seriously, Barton's picking up of Gervinho was a much more aggressive move than the pathetic tap he received in return. The ostentatious shaking of everyone's hand at the end was sickening too

joey barton 'is' 'a legend'

Apparently nowhere in FIFA's Laws of the Game does it say that raised hands = automatic red card.

Much like "last defender, he's got to go"

Or "he got the ball first"

"lost control of the ball"

Just checked the laws and indeed no mention of raised hands = automatic red. Where the fuck did that come from?

Anything about raised eyebrows?

Nothing I'm afraid.

The laws of the game are pretty vague and there are a lot of generally agreed customs on how they should be interpreted

some of them seem to be pretty enshrined, eg the "raising the hands to the face = red, below the neck = yellow" thing seems to be a fairly accurate model for how refs react to those kind of things; some of them are just imaginary shit, like how a defender "getting the ball" leads to pundits wrongly claiming a bad tackle was fair 10 times a match

arbitrary rules are awes fuiud

yeah i think the hand raised to the face is almost always interpreted as "violent conduct". the "last man back" is usually shorthand for saying "denied a clear goal-scoring opportunity" and in 95 percent of situations where a foul stops a player being one on one with the keeper that seems fair enough.

can be trumped by "heading away from goal" though, like Richardson on Suarez today

If only that were true of penalty decisions in the box as well Eboue wouldn't have conceded one against Lucas in the 1-1 late last season.

a foul is a foul is a foul, that's different to whether or not a particular challenge merits a red or a yellow

Flanno's been impressive but I don't know why Kelly didn't start.

Aquilani is surely off. In a way I'll be glad cos I'm bored of this now.

Why did we look so unfit in the 2nd half? Ok match sharpness mightn't have been totally there but there's no excuse for not actually being able to move around the pitch.

Dirk's an absolute legend.

Downing looked good.

Enrique looked like he'd been playing for us for years, really excited about him.

Might've been harsh on Carroll earlier.

So Carragher remains a 1st choice CB this season by the look of it - bye bye playing a high defensive line, hello massive gap between the back 4 and launching long balls to Carroll.