…. I think this rather sums up the issue here, myself. Not that it’s necessarily true (about the feigned agony). It may well be – to an extent it almost certainly is since pretty much everyone seems to exaggerate even real injuries just a little bit. The point is it seems to be so friggin’ easy to do. I know that , personally, I never make any judgement on fouls/injuries etc until I see a nice close-up replay afterwards (even then you sometimes have to think long and hard about the actual physics of an incident). I used to, but the number of times I found myself saying ‘get up you pansy’ to a television set only to see a man virtually knee-capped on replay induced me to change this habit. Sometimes your vantage point is just bad and/or the acting just too good. Generally the ref is in a better position to judge, but not always – he isn’t god. Which is why making NO recourse to video evidence EVER strikes me as so ridiculous. I mean, there really are good arguments against its widespread use – the best of which being that this is a game that just isn’t played in the same sort of punctuated frenetic periods of play (yay the letter ‘p’) as are other codes. Play just doesn’t die every time a contentious event occurs allowing for a call upon the video and I think we’re just going to have to wear that a certain degree of bad calls the entire televisual audience can see are bad are going to creep in.

But PENALTIES? The same argument just doesn’t hold here. Play is often dead with a capital D in such instances. Moreover, since an incorrect call can be tantamount to handing one side a victory and leaving a bad taste in everyone’s mouth there is simply no excuse for not taking steps to make sure your call is the right one. None at all. And unless it happens, diving is just not going to stop at points such as this one. The player in question risks a yellow card for a chance to win the game – the only way this is ever going to look like a bad idea (for other than moral reasons) is if he KNOWS he’s going to be caught.

And while I’d agree with you that the talk of diving/cheating Italians is unfortunate, I don’t think it should cloud the issue over whether or not THIS Italian on THIS occasion took a dive to win the match. Look at the footage in the cold light of day, especially with regard to various parties’ accounts of what happened (Grosso’s statement that he got caught in Neil’s legs and had no choice but to go down, for instance) and I find it hard to understand people’s reluctance to believe that he dived. I think BOTH sides should be mad at what happened here to some degree.

I mean, Suppose Italy wins the world cup. Grosso’s antics kind of rob them of the chance to enjoy that as they should, which is rather sad.

All you people accusing italians of being huge divers should rewatch the match and see just how much time australia spends on the floor writhing in feigned agony.

I am from Australia and I think it was a PK. We were great but now we are a joke because the whole world views us as sulky losers.

Nice one guys.

@ USA referee… What does that mean…. Smacks of double standards. or at least is a statement with two opposing meanings.

P.s:@ MARCO and company, let the poor country where i’m posting from stay out of this slanging match. I’m an aussie here for a business deal. not an indian.

That was such a DIVE, I mean look at how far he travels, NOTE-this is a stationary man, he’s just at maximum clipped him with the front of his boot and he goes flying as if he’s been hit by a semi-trailer. I mean I see, this sort of stuff all the time in amateur soccer, its just embarassing that a referee hasn’t been able to pick it up. Really embarrassing, if it were any other team my feelings would still be the same, they were hard done by and they got a raw deal. Gusso was on a yellow at the time and probably should’ve been given another and sent off and Australia should’ve played against 9 men. No offence guys thats the truth and the fact how he laughs his head off afterwards,just acts to the fact how the referee has obviously been conned.