Sorry, gotta disagree. It would be an improper message - responding to violence with even more violence and then getting away with it.

I'm all about deterent personally. The fan knew that if he attacked the keeper he was going to end up in trouble whether the keeper reacted or not. NOT punishing the keeper, means they are allowing (unpunished) self defense. If I am going to attack someone now, knowing they can fight back without worry about how they will be punished would make me think twice about doing it because I could end up getting a beating as a result. Whereas if he was going to be punished, he'd be an easy target as he might not want to fight back and face punishment himself.

Disagree with the red card, but I agree with how they've handled it in not charging the keeper.

This post has been edited by kurtsimonw: Dec 23 2011, 08:00 AM

Why did he get sent-off?! This has nothing to do with football, he was defending himself, the 2nd kick was a bit unnecessary but this is above football.

I guess everyone's forgot about the Seles incident.

So,if someone hits you,you just don't react to him?

Exactly. Unlike precedent cases, the fan went straight to the goalie with the intention of kicking him. It's only natural he'd react that way, though I agree with Ash that the second kick was unnecessary.

Anyway, the Dutch FA has discarded the red card. And Ajax has banned the fan from the stadium for life. Goalie wins!

If he was defending himself he would have kicked him to the ground and be done with it. The fact that he kept on kicking him after the man went to the ground, and you can really see that the keeper wanted to get him real good, than the red is justified imo.

Push him to the ground in self defence but let the stewards handle the rest, I've seen players do this countless times when an invader goes directly for them. Going for multiple kicks after the guy was already subdued and on the ground was pointless

Agreed han.

Come on,stop being unrealistic.Everyone gets angry,you can't expect everyone to react the way you would....

I'm not saying that I would react differently, but I wouldn't go crying and stomping my foot if I got a red card for it. That is what I feel was justified. The fact that he lost it and started kicking him while he was down on the floor is why I feel that the ref was justified in showing the card. I'm not judging him because he did that, but the reaction towards the ref sending him off is what I'm judging. If he didn't want to suffer any consequences than he shouldn't have done that, simple imo.

You can't expect that you'll get off free for doing something like that simply because you weren't the instigator

The FA could have punished him, his own club could have too. But the ref had absolutely no right in showing him the red card.

He was on the pitch during a game, I would think that the ref had every right to do so. And it really did not look like the club had any problem with him kicking the sh!t out of the guy

Does it say in the regulation that the ref can ban a player for reasons not related to the game?

To be fair I didn't see the reaction of the goalkeeper.

He was still on the pitch during a game, and behaved like a total idiot. Imo what the ref did was just.


He practically tried to attack the ref, and only didn't manage it because he was held back by others.

Well, the red card has been taken away and the goalie has not been punishied by the police. The Dutch are 100% right in their final decisions because the goalie did nothing wrong. Fortunately law appreciates that we are human and have emotion. If you're talking about a robot han, I agree completely. But I think being attacked like that, the reaction of the goalie was both understandable and expected.