RedTez wrote:
Shawcross was not totally innocent in that challenge. The other one you refer to was far more dangerous, but there was an element of risk on the Ramsey one. What wound me up more about that was Pulis and his cronies saying "he's not that type of player". He was a dirty get at United and Stoke have built on that. Defend him all you like, if that challenge had been on someone at a small club like Carlos Tevez or Wayne Bridge, the reaction would've been the same.
Have Citeh had 2 other players injured with broken legs in the last few years? I don't think they have, so it'd be pretty difficult for Citeh to be jumping up and down about how they were being targeted by hatchetmen and not allowed to play their football if they didn't have the other incidents to whine about as well.
Arsenal did. And boy did they complain about it.
I just don't believe the reaction would've been the same with the majority of other clubs. IMO it was an unfortunate accident but these things happen in football. But the instant reaction from Arsenal players was to jump up and down over it (literally) and rush at Shawcross and the referee as though it was a clearly malicious tackle.
I don't give a **** if Shawcross is a dirty player. Every team has them. Some of them, for example Roy Keane at United or Patrick Viera at Arsenal, go on to achieve legend status while doing it. Just because Shawcross is never going to become a Keane or a Viera doesn't mean that Stoke should be banned from ever having that type of player. Being at Stoke just means that their clogger won't have many of the extra qualities that the Viera's and Keane's have, but that doesn't mean that Stoke set out to kick sides off the park.
