Are Swindon a bunch of cheats?

[dh625y]

To stop polluting the Sheff. Utd. v Swindon thread, and to give a single place for opposition fans to praise Swindon's sportsmanship throughout the rest of the season, a dedicated thread seems appropriate.

To get you started, here's an unbiased summary so far.

Case for the prosecution:
+ When being variously tackled from the side, from behind, or even two-footed from the front, shirts tugged, or pushed in the back, Swindon players sometimes fall down too easily
+ When the target of an attempted backwards headbutt or elbow to the face, again Swindon players fall down too easily
+ When referees fail to stamp down on violent conduct, or persistent fouling, Swindon players complain too much
+ Swindon players have sometimes celebrated winning games, or even worse, celebrated important decisions in a game that have gone Swindon's way
+ In particular, Bristol City, have been on the end of a lot of falling over, complaining and celebrating, although other teams' supporters have also noticed this, so there is clearly a trend, the dirty Swindon cheats!

Case for the defense:
+ Referees in the lower leagues are even worse than the muppets in the EPL, and need help in coming to the right decisions
+ Young players coming through EPL academies are trained to go down after any contact if there is a tactical advantage; Swindon are just exploiting this more effectively than other teams
+ Swindon's style of play is based upon passing the ball around and through the opposition, so when the opposition try to win the ball back through excessive physical contact (i.e. fouling) rather than clean tackles or interceptions, Swindon players go down to make the foul or attempted foul clear to the referee
+ Some opposition managers set out with a game plan to prevent passing teams play football out from the back through physical attacks which they claim are fair attempts to play the ball, the dirty opposition cheats!

Let the posts flow! [Especially from BCFC fans ]

Edit: fixed a couple of grammar errors - yes I'm a bit like that

 

[JonBCFC]

Yes.

 

[old parkender]

Yes

 

[This Charming Mike]

No.

Think some people need to look up the definition of cheating to be honest.

 

[blade1889]

yes, never seen owt like it yesterday but it did make for a good (or at least better than usual) atmosphere

 

[Aaron-Bcfc]

Swindon were cheating against us to be fair. They were also going down very easily against Coventry but were still outstanding on the day. Doesn't surprise me that Blades fans are saying the same, but then again we've had Crewe fans call us cheats as well.

 

[Scumarmy.]

Yes

 

[This Charming Mike]

Swindon were cheating against us to be fair. They were also going down very easily against Coventry but were still outstanding on the day. Doesn't surprise me that Blades fans are saying the same, but then again we've had Crewe fans call us cheats as well.

Could you please provide some examples of the cheating on show against Bristol City? 'Going down easily' is not a form of cheating by the way.

 

[Aaron-Bcfc]

Could you please provide some examples of the cheating on show against Bristol City? 'Going down easily' is not a form of cheating by the way.

It isn't cheating in the rule book but it's still a pretty unsporting thing to do. (Unless your in the Premier League, where it is accepted by all)

The main example of cheating was when your lad fouled Wade Elliott twice, grabbed him around the neck, then when Wade reacted (without actually touching him) he falls to the floor holding his face and rolling around. The celebrations after the red from your players and at the final whistle were also over the top. That isn't cheating obviously, but it's still annoying, and definitely left things more heated than they should've been. Anyway, this has been argued over countless times already! I shouldn't have posted in the first place as this may escalate now...

 

[RavenBish]

From what I've seen of them they're just well-drilled in the art of going down easily and getting away with punches and elbows off the ball. Bellends rather than cheats.

 

[This Charming Mike]

It isn't cheating in the rule book but it's still a pretty unsporting thing to do. (Unless your in the Premier League, where it is accepted by all)

The main example of cheating was when your lad fouled Wade Elliott twice, grabbed him around the neck, then when Wade reacted (without actually touching him) he falls to the floor holding his face and rolling around. The celebrations after the red from your players and at the final whistle were also over the top. That isn't cheating obviously, but it's still annoying, and definitely left things more heated than they should've been. Anyway, this has been argued over countless times already! I shouldn't have posted in the first place as this may escalate now...

Unsporting is probably correct. Sadly, it's part and parcel of the game now and you'd be hard pressed to find a team that fields players that never go down easily. I don't condone it but it isn't against the rules.

The Elliot vs Stephens incident has been done to death but I'll repeat my stance from the thread that got lost when TFF went down. I believe that Stephens fouled Elliot twice in the build-up to the incident. However, it is up to the officials to notice this and what followed is inexcusable from your captain in my opinion. Video footage of the incident is unclear so whether it involved cheating will continue to be up for debate.

 

[Heisenberg20]

Are Swindon a bunch of cheats? In a word, Yes!

 

[hodge]

This is actually along the lines of what I'm doing my dissertation on, from what I've seen and read Swindon pretty much push gamesmanship to the max and border on deviance (cheating) in occasions like the Elliott/Stephens incident (if Elliott didn't make contact, as has been said video evidence is largely inconclusive). Do they play within the spirit of the game... errrrrmmm not really, do the rules allow them to get away with it yes. Teams may not like it but its up to the officials to clamp down on them so they can't get away with it.

 

[Luke_ciderhead]

Unsportsmanlike and prone to pushing the boundaries of what you can get away with?.. Yes for sure. Outright cheats? No way. I reckon that a lot of our fans are just uncomfortable with how youve kept up with us all season to be honest, not to mention ended our unbeaten run. Take it as a compliament.

 

[GFCSludge]

They've been cheats at least since March 1979.

 

[RavenBish]

Unsporting is probably correct. Sadly, it's part and parcel of the game now and you'd be hard pressed to find a team that fields players that never go down easily. I don't condone it but it isn't against the rules.
.

Ours much to my massive displeasure because it's fucked us out of about 5 penalties. Against Peterborough the other week, Bajner got scythed when through on goal early on and it's a red card, a penalty and probably an easy game but no, the big massive fucker stumbled on like a wounded giraffe and kicked it straight at the keeper whilst in a position I previously thought to be anatomically impossible (ref should've still given a penalty but they never do in that situation).

 

[joethegill]

Oldham were worse.

 

[dh625y]

This is actually along the lines of what I'm doing my dissertation on, from what I've seen and read Swindon pretty much push gamesmanship to the max and border on deviance (cheating) in occasions like the Elliott/Stephens incident (if Elliott didn't make contact, as has been said video evidence is largely inconclusive). Do they play within the spirit of the game... errrrrmmm not really, do the rules allow them to get away with it yes. Teams may not like it but its up to the officials to clamp down on them so they can't get away with it.

If your dissertation is for OTIB, then I think you'll do fine. Particularly "deviance". But if it is a bit less partisan, then you might want to think about eye witness evidence as well. There was plenty of it on various forums from people close to the incident who said Elliot had at least attempted to make contact. IIRC one of them was even a BCFC fan?

And you may also want to think about other ways teams push gamesmanship to the limit, for example through persistent and violent fouling. So your thesis could be: teams use a physical approach to compensate for lack of skill, as strength is cheaper to buy than skill. Your antithesis is: Skillful teams adopt an approach of easily falling over under physical contact to try to negate the physical approach. And your synthesis may be: better quality decisions (once Sepp Blatter is ejected and we get replays and challenges, or better trained and remunerated referees) and punishment of both forms of gamesmanship lead football back to its original intent (i.e. that the team with most money wins).

That would make the basis of a good dissertation I think. Even better if you consider why some forms of gamesmanship are considered more acceptable than others.

 

[hodge]

Well its more based around peoples understanding of what gamesmanship actually is and a perceived acceptance of it in amateur sport.

In the above you've posted, what about teams who use a combination of skill and physicality in their teams? Using us as an example, with the likes of Freeman, JET and Elliott amongst others while we also have the likes of Flint, Matt Smith etc. Would you class us as somewhat of a middle ground?

 

[John Locke]

+ Some opposition managers set out with a game plan to prevent passing teams play football out from the back through physical attacks which they claim are fair attempts to play the ball, the dirty opposition cheats!

Wade Elliott's assault on Jack Stephens just minutes into November's match being a perfect example of this.

 

[dh625y]

Well its more based around peoples understanding of what gamesmanship actually is and a perceived acceptance of it in amateur sport.

In the above you've posted, what about teams who use a combination of skill and physicality in their teams? Using us as an example, with the likes of Freeman, JET and Elliott amongst others while we also have the likes of Flint, Matt Smith etc. Would you class us as somewhat of a middle ground?

Yes I'd class that as a synthesis, and synthesis is typically the best approach long term. Doesn't mean that the approach can't be changed to suite the opposition.

I'm a little surprised you class Elliott with Freeman rather than Flint, but I suppose you see him every week, I only see him when he plays Swindon.

 

[Robert Molenaar]

They were genuinely disgusting when they came to VP earlier this season, easily the worst side for going down and making themselves look embarrassing. That said, it obviously worked for them, as they won the game.

 

[Bottega Don]

Swindon loved throwing them self to the ground on the first day of the season.

To be fair though, so did Bristol City and Preston, we should really try it.

 

[blade1889]

Swindon loved throwing them self to the ground on the first day of the season.

To be fair though, so did Bristol City and Preston, we should really try it.

teams at the top do seem to do it more, we've got some (mainly Baxter) that go down easily

 

[plops]

Oh for the love of god I thought we could move on from Swindon vs Bristol City 2014 for fear that people might be getting a tad bored and now this. We aren't rivals least we forget.

On a day where we collected the most cards.......really.......

One blades fan who thinks higdon is a saint and we are cheats ffs look at blades forums and I think you'll find many label him as a knob for putting himself in a position to get send off at thirty odd years old.

Next.....nothing happening here.

 

[JonBCFC]

Oh for the love of god I thought we could move on from Swindon vs Bristol City 2014 for fear that people might be getting a tad bored and now this. We aren't rivals least we forget.

On a day where we collected the most cards.......really.......

One blades fan who thinks higdon is a saint and we are cheats ffs look at blades forums and I think you'll find many label him as a knob for putting himself in a position to get send off at thirty odd years old.

Next.....nothing happening here.

You do realise it was one of your own that created this thread?

 

[plops]

Yes but point remains........maybe he's an angler by trade.......and what's angling it's f'ing Boring. Even when getting such a vast and easy catch.

 

[JonBCFC]

Yes but point remains........maybe he's an angler by trade.......and what's angling it's f'ing Boring. Even when getting such a vast and easy catch.

Perhaps you should tell said fan, to stop posting such pathetic and cringey threads then. I, along with plenty of other city fans are more than willing to not clash until April the 6th.

 

[blade1889]

One blades fan who thinks higdon is a saint and we are cheats ffs look at blades forums and I think you'll find many label him as a knob for putting himself in a position to get send off at thirty odd years old.

Next.....nothing happening here.

He ain't no saint but your players tried getting him sent off from the start. I have looked on the Blades forums (well, one of them) and I think you'll find the majority are saying they feel sorry for him the way you targeted him. We don't like Higdon, he's been a big disappointment since he's signed but many Blades yesterday gave him a standing ovation appreciating what you were doing to him...unlike when he was jeered from the pitch previously. And it wasn't just for your play acting with Higdon that I think you're cheats btw. Long live saint Higdon, forcing our hand in subbing him arguably got us the win.

but anyway, whatever, it had no negative impact for us whether you cheated or not. And this is getting boring now, we ain't ever going to agree so its a pretty pointless argument.

 

[The Southbank]

Are Swindon a bunch of fannies? Yes.