General Gamesmanship, game management, and drinks breaks

[The mighty Aldo]

What about Westley and the 23rd minute dark art

I think we should employ Severus Snape to coach us in the ways of the dark arts

 

[ZeroTheHero]

It's the sort of thing that as a fan you hate being used against you but have no issues with when your team are doing it!

No - I actually hate it when we do it as well. I wish the refs/FA were stronger and punished teams for doing it. I want to watch two teams play a game of football to see who is the better at football, not to see who has the better acting and time wasting skills. It is cheating.

 

[ZeroTheHero]

I didn’t watch the women’s World Cup final but apparently we kept the ball in the corner for the last ten minutes.

I think that's different. If you are keeping the ball in play and the other team isn't good enough to get it off you then that is IMO a valid tactic.

 

[Carlislehotdog]

As well as the 'game management', it feels this season that we are sticking the going in hard, going in late and tackling from behind all a bit more than I can remember in recent years. Have thought a few times while watching that I'd think "what a dirty team" if I was an opposition fan.

Whether that's having a tougher-tackling back four, some kind of deliberate strategy or just frustration from chasing games because we're not as good now, I don't know, but there definitely seems a different vibe this season.

 

[tonyw]

Have to say that I didn't think that we were that bad on Saturday - sure, we were slow to get the ball back in play but it was nothing egregious.

Tuesday at Pompey was worse, and I think arguably crossed the line. One too many players sitting down at convenient moments. Being slow is one thing, but feigning injury is simply cheating.

The ref actually did his best to punish us by finding 8 additional minutes - but honestly, they need to come down harder. Have an independent timekeeper, and do a better job of adding all the lost time from cramps, knocks and physio visits. It might at least make the worst offenders pause if they had to face 15 minutes of injury time every game.

 

[OUFCGav]

After the midweek Pompey game, we were accused of timewasting by an obsessed home fan who took a picture of every time one of our players was down injured.

Oxford and Portsmouth fans get into timewasting spat with 'photos to prove' - Fan Banter

Oxford and Portsmouth fans seemingly get into a timewasting spat with ‘photos to prove’ following the midweek meeting between the two. Colby Bishop netted a 78th-minute equaliser to give Portsmouth a draw at home to 10-man Oxford, who saw Billy Bodin sent off 18 minutes from time after picking...

fanbanter.co.uk

Bolton away:
Robinson : "we slowed the game down when they had their best moment." “I would call it gamesmanship, some will call it other things and one set play and all of a sudden, it’s 3-1 and from then on we were okay.”

Oxford boss Robinson's 'gamesmanship' admission after securing Bolton victory

The U's beat the Whites 3-1 at the University of Bolton Stadium

www.manchestereveningnews.co.uk

Bolton manager Ian Evatt : we must manage the 'dark arts' better.

Evatt outlines why Bolton must manage 'dark arts' better in future

Wanderers tasted defeat over the weekend against Oxford United

www.manchestereveningnews.co.uk

the Pompey guy who took all the photos/tweeted is a journalist - https://www.joemichalczuk.co.uk/

 

[OUFCGav]

Was actually 25 minutes 30 seconds.

I thought it would have been more in a free flowing half. For about the first 15 minutes the ball was only in play about 50% of the time.

I may have to watch the Portsmouth second half to compare!

OPTA did some ball in play stats earlier in the season in the EPL, and the average for the full games was 54m39s

 

[MarkG]

It's a shame, we don't want to be known as a team like Wycombe/ Stevenage etc. But that's a number of games now where we've used the dark arts or whatever. It's hard for the ref to crack down if we are not actually breaking rules, and who's to say if a player has cramp or not and requires the physio?

 

[Marked Ox]

After the midweek Pompey game, we were accused of timewasting by an obsessed home fan who took a picture of every time one of our players was down injured.

Oxford and Portsmouth fans get into timewasting spat with 'photos to prove' - Fan Banter

Oxford and Portsmouth fans seemingly get into a timewasting spat with ‘photos to prove’ following the midweek meeting between the two. Colby Bishop netted a 78th-minute equaliser to give Portsmouth a draw at home to 10-man Oxford, who saw Billy Bodin sent off 18 minutes from time after picking...

fanbanter.co.uk

Bolton away:
Robinson : "we slowed the game down when they had their best moment." “I would call it gamesmanship, some will call it other things and one set play and all of a sudden, it’s 3-1 and from then on we were okay.”

Oxford boss Robinson's 'gamesmanship' admission after securing Bolton victory

The U's beat the Whites 3-1 at the University of Bolton Stadium

www.manchestereveningnews.co.uk

Bolton manager Ian Evatt : we must manage the 'dark arts' better.

Evatt outlines why Bolton must manage 'dark arts' better in future

Wanderers tasted defeat over the weekend against Oxford United

www.manchestereveningnews.co.uk

With Pompey, I'll just say Ronan Curtis and leave it there.

 

[Marked Ox]

I think that's different. If you are keeping the ball in play and the other team isn't good enough to get it off you then that is IMO a valid tactic.

Spot on. The other team has to be good enough to get it back, if they aren't tough and that goes for us too.

 

[m]

I don't care which team it is "practising the dark arts", it's cheating and has no place in the game. It has been getting worse every season. Poor officials who are influenced by the writhing on the ground are now not penalising the time wasting to the extent they should and coaches are using that to their advantage. It then infuriates one set of fans and leads to more unrest.
Surely gaining an advantage by unfair means should not be allowed to go unpunished? The trouble being that it has all become so common place, it will just be refined to another level.


And this is the outcome. None of us want to lose so, we start to accept it as part and parcel of the game. How long before we have a "stoppage coach" whose job it will be to come up with new ways of conning the officials?

It's frustrating.

I'm sure we'd all love to see Oxford rise above and triumph. But, when we're as deep as we are in the do at the moment, I'll accept us doing whatever we can to get points on the board. By inference I suppose I'd accept it to get us promoted.

It's going to take the FA or EFL to first acknowledge it, and then tackle it. I won't hold my breath.

 

[MarkG]

I was reading about it on the Athletic today. One of the notorious was the World Cup final when Materazzo called Zidane’s mother a whore to provoke a reaction. The headbutt followed and that was that.

 

[The mighty Aldo]

I think when you see teams who are struggling at the bottom of the league, you know that they will come and play this way and try and Nick a goal and defend like hell.
I don’t mind that they are in an awful position and will do anything to try and get the points.Except if they’re Wycom who do this whereever they are in the league
We are struggling but in the last two games when we’ve had eleven on the pitch we tried to counter attack and still played good football.
We have often said we are too nice well this is what you have to do sometimes

 

[Osei Yaw]

Whatever league we're in, we'll come up against opposition who do it. When we eventually get to The Championship then realistically we would have to do it more than we have over the last few seasons. When you don't have the players to outplay the opposition for 90 minutes then it's what you do. That said, it's also one of those things that gets overlooked more when the top teams do it. I don't watch much Premier League football, but Guardiola instilled tactical fouls when he arrived at Man City. Man City could have 65%/70% ball possession, but the moment they lost the ball (inevitably deep in the opposition half), an attacking player would commit a little foul to stop the opposition from getting out quickly. Call it gamesmanship if you like, it's a similar principal as far as I'm concerned.

I also think it's a little harsh blaming refs for stopping games if there is a head injury or something that may be serious. There would be uproar if they didn't and it turned out to be serious. What I always like to see is a ref who stops a player coming back on the pitch immediately after treatment if the player has obviously gone down to waste time and break up the opposition's rhythm.

On another note, people love to moan about the standard of reffing but who would be one? For a start, this thread acknowledges that a lot of the players on the pitch are going to cheat to gain an advantage, then you've got thousands of fans telling you you're wrong and managers getting in your face at full time. They're held to completely different standards from everyone else.

 

[Oxford1996]

I have no issue with it all especially if it sees us get results like the last 2.

That being said, as a fanbase we can’t moan it when other clubs do it.

 

[The mighty Aldo]

Whatever league we're in, we'll come up against opposition who do it. When we eventually get to The Championship then realistically we would have to do it more than we have over the last few seasons. When you don't have the players to outplay the opposition for 90 minutes then it's what you do. That said, it's also one of those things that gets overlooked more when the top teams do it. I don't watch much Premier League football, but Guardiola instilled tactical fouls when he arrived at Man City. Man City could have 65%/70% ball possession, but the moment they lost the ball (inevitably deep in the opposition half), an attacking player would commit a little foul to stop the opposition from getting out quickly. Call it gamesmanship if you like, it's a similar principal as far as I'm concerned.

I also think it's a little harsh blaming refs for stopping games if there is a head injury or something that may be serious. There would be uproar if they didn't and it turned out to be serious. What I always like to see is a ref who stops a player coming back on the pitch immediately after treatment if the player has obviously gone down to waste time and break up the opposition's rhythm.

On another note, people love to moan about the standard of reffing but who would be one? For a start, this thread acknowledges that a lot of the players on the pitch are going to cheat to gain an advantage, then you've got thousands of fans telling you you're wrong and managers getting in your face at full time. They're held to completely different standards from everyone else.

Regarding the ref stopping the game that is fine. Player goes down injured usually for a foul anyway. Ref gives the free kick checks the player, if it’s not a head injury he calls physio on and the game continues with the physio treating the player on the pitch, if it is a head injury he is taken off and assessed but the gamecontinues
This would soon make players realise they only stay down for serious knocks

 

[BDJ]

Regarding the ref stopping the game that is fine. Player goes down injured usually for a foul anyway. Ref gives the free kick checks the player, if it’s not a head injury he calls physio on and the game continues with the physio treating the player on the pitch, if it is a head injury he is taken off and assessed but the gamecontinues
This would soon make players realise they only stay down for serious knocks

They'd probably start sitting down in the six-yard box, right in front of the goal, instead!

 

[The mighty Aldo]

They'd probably start sitting down in the six-yard box, right in front of the goal, instead!

In that case play still goes on but that player could play our forwards onside ,so it’s not in their interest

 

[CCYellow]

I think if a player goes down injured, then they should be kept on the sidelines for twice the amount of time they were down.
You know, in the players interests, to make sure they're OK.

 

[nick68]

It's simple really if a player goes down and gets the game stopped then her should be forced to leave the field and only return on the referees say so, that should soon deter fake injuries where they don't want the trainer on but the ref is compelled to halt the game.
Also I would bring in a rule where the 4th official brings drinks to the centre circle and all players have to stay away from the touchline to avoid deliberate coaching breaks.

Unfortunately it needs refs with a spine to carry this out so never going to happen.