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Ajeti FA wait sees football heading for theatre of absurd

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Our latest report that the Football Association has until Tuesday evening  to overrule the VAR decision involving Albian Ajeti  surely demonstrates the game we all love is hurtling into a theatre of the absurd!

VAR looked at whether he was guilt of violent conduct when his head appeared to brush into Mason Holgate’s face towards the end of yesterday’s game against Everton.

However, after VAR ruled out an expulsion for the striker saying no violent conduct was involved one assumed was the end of the matter.

But absolutely not in the rule-crazy new world affecting the game with the Hammer insiders telling us that even that could be kicked out by the FA if they choose.

Madness,  and here’s how ClaretandHugh Facebook Group member Mike Ayers responded – correctly in our view: “This is now becoming absolutely farcical!

“A ref takes a decision based upon information passed from VAR that can then be overturned by a third set of officials a few days later.

Can this then be appealed methinks? And can the FA board also overturn a previous referee / VAR decision upon a scored goal that may have had a problem somewhere in the lead up! Where will it all end?”

And a CandH website follower simply calling himself Mojen added: “So they can overturn that if they feel like it but not a Declan Rice handball which was headed on to his hand by a Sheffield United player.

Just what is the point of football anymore? It appears what VAR says is completely bendable. Whole thing is pointless then.”

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Hugh Southon is a lifelong Iron and the founding editor of ClaretandHugh. He is a national newspaper journalist of many years experience and was Bobby Moore's 'ghost' writer during the great man's lifetime. He describes ClaretandHugh as "the Hammers daily newspaper!"

Follow on Twitter @hughsouthon

26 comments

  • Hammer64 says:

    Well that’s your opinion & you may be right. But the fact that Moyes doesn’t spend much in January may also be at least partly because his bosses didn’t have cash to spend. Most of the time he was at Everton that seemed to be the case. In addition, Everton were usually doing ok & didn’t need to spend. And there is a widespread view in football (which doesn’t necessarily make it right) that January is not a good time for buying players anyway.

    My view is that it probably won’t make much difference whether we end up with one player coming in or four & we will go down anyway. Hope I’m wrong. From memory most of those players listed in your article that we bought it Jan hardly played, & very few made much difference. If we do go down in my opinion it will be mainly because changing managers was left too late, not because Moyes refuses to spend in January.

  • Hammer64 says:

    I don’t know whether Moyes would have been any keener to buy in January if you are right that he doesn’t like January signings. But do you really believe that an extra 5/6 weeks would not have increased the chances of making better informed decisions on transfers? More time to decide which players to move on, to look at whose available?Time to open negotiations with agents?
    I get the impression that Moyes was not your first choice. He wasn’t mine either, & an earlier decision on Pellegrini would have also given a wider choice of replacements.

    • I don’t think it would have made a scrap of difference 64 because the piece I’ve just written on his 15 year winter buys shows less than one every Jan. The club meanwhile has spent £47m in Jan buys plus one or two undisclosed fees plus loan fees in 10 years. THere’s not a lot of dough around but they will find it if there’s someone he really wants I’d believe. Even with another four weeks available were he wanting to buy it never happens til the very end anyway. Way it is.

    • Good Ole Daze says:

      Leaving the January transfers issue aside, an earlier decision would have allowed Moyes to get the team organised and more difficult to beat in those crucial 5/6 weeks – even if either Roberto or Martin was in goal. Apart from the Sheffield mistake, Martin did everything that could have been expected of him.

  • Hammer64 says:

    Just to avoid confusion this is Hammer64 as opposed to Hammers64. My take on this is that we can’t expect much in the window, partly because as Sara says he has barely got his feet under the table. If we’ve want well researched, well scouted,transfers (which we do) I would think that takes time.

    Of course, if the owners had been ready to admit their mistake over Pellegrini & act on it more quickly a new manager would have had time to see what he needed well before the window opened. Some deals will always be difficult but some have been signed & sealed over the last two weeks. It is clear we are in serious trouble now, but I still think the squad we had in mid November didn’t need major surgery (not if we are just talking survival). Three, ideally four, new players & a manager who knew what he was doing and we would have been ok. I think that 5/6 week delay, when the writing was on the wall, might turn out to be the main reason we are likely to be watching Championship games again next season. And yes, I realise I can’t prove that & that even if I could what’s done is done etc etc. But when we are struggling in the coming weeks & wondering why we couldn’t get in the players we needed that point needs to be part of the discussion- we left it too late making the change.

  • Robert Paul Bass says:

    If Ajeti does get charged, will the VAR team be suspended for the next round of matches? Not as if they can dump them onto League 1 like they do with referees. With regard to transfers, it’s very easy to scream we need this and we need that: half decent players are unlikely to come in for a relegation scrap, without a get out should we go down. So stop complaining (mostly a reference to other WHU related sites) short term loans it will probably have to be. Also not sure what we can bring in with regard to squad size rules etc, and salary cap rules.

  • Sara says:

    In any case I would rather they didn’t make any knee jerk signings just for the sake of it. Policy should be only buy players that are better than what we’ve already got.

  • Sara says:

    Let’s consider how many days David Moyes has been in the job.

  • Hammers64 says:

    Am i the only one wondering what on earth is going on in the transfer market .? 12 days to go and nothing on the radar at all.Why we need a month long transfer window is beyond me when so little happens for 95 % of it.Either the owners are playing this one very close to their chests or we are going to be thrown under a bus with lack of activity in a crucial next few days for the club especially now our only other recognised striker could be missing for 3 games.

    • Hammer64: Check out the Moyes record at his various clubs in the market rather than listen to anything from me you may feel is aimed at a defence of anyone . It’s quite well known across the country what he’s like.

      • Hammers64 says:

        Sorry but i have come to the conclusion the owners do not want to spend any money.They have a goalkeeper now and Antonio is due back for 2 or 3 games so why bother with strengthening the squad,The subs bench yesterday was a joke with 3 centre backs and Moyes alluded to it at the time.Not saying for a moment you are defending the owners or whoever but something just does not sit right here.

        • Hammers64 says:

          Just to finish.As i mentioned earlier on another thread.If Haller is taken out by a rash challenge tomorrow in training or against Leicester we literally do not have a 1st team striker.How can anybody associated with the club at whatever level justify that.?.There is no forward thinking and these things do come back and bite hard.After the Fabianski debacle that should be obvious.

        • No need to apologise – we’ll see by Feb 2 and I don’t see much action elsewhere. I’ll wait and take a look when window closes. All I suggested was that you should check out his January record

        • I will be looking at Moyes record at his various down the years in January which will give us an idea and I will also take a look at our winter signings since 2010 and do a piece

  • Dave says:

    Don’t know why anyone is worried.
    He has played about 10 mins since he signed.
    Hardly going to be missed , at least it will give a new excuse.
    Fine him 2 weeks wages for being an idiot.

  • Whambo says:

    As an answer to Moyed I would say that VAR is here to take all of the excitement out of the game and all of the exhilaration of a goal being scored away from the players and fans.They don’t like goals being scored and will have a big party and award themselves large bonuses when all 10 games on a weekend end in 0-0 draws.

  • Steve Shelley says:

    Could VAR go back to strike out Tevezs goals for us that kept us from bring relegated?
    It’s getting that crazy!!!

  • Jonnyd says:

    No sympathy
    The officials got it wrong and Ajeti knew what was doing and deserves a red

  • mojen says:

    As to the question where will it all end who knows ? A legal challenge maybe ? Now wouldnt that be interesting !

    • Wjo1974 says:

      Not condoning it but no one mentions the knee in the back that started it or the booting Ajeti got from him a few minutes earlier. If all you saw was MOTD things weren’t all as has been shown. I was behind the goal when it was happening and said it at the time. Watch it again and watch the knee from Holgate which was the first incident so can we go back and have the penalty please?

Comments are closed.