There’s really a whole culture of spewing all this shite out. Phrases like ‘only one team wanted to win’ seep into sports vernacular because of dull, unopinionated pundits who can’t string two sentences together without talking about how good wanye rooney is.

here’s a game for next season- watch motd and count how many uneccessary compliments are given to sir wayne of rooney each week. Compliments which, if it was anyone else, would never leave their mouths

I didn’t believe that. It couldn’t have made for a less entertaining game.

i’m sorry Callum, but this assessment is frankly risible.

I would actually be inclined the be generous to De Jong on this. Not in terms of timing, but more to do with the fact that he didn’t appear to have looked in Alonso’s direction; so for that much alone, I wouldn’t ascribe intent to him.

Howeve (outside of the EPL, where referee’s get away with interpreting clear and unambiguous FIFA guidelines with impunity) the intent isn’t relevant in deciding the punishment here. it was wild and dangerous. It was a red card (and probably more, in terms of suspension). The only reason it wasn’t a red was because Webb didn’t get a clear view as to the extent of the challenge (i think many people’s initial reaction viewing on TV in real time was the same). It was unbelievably bad. If any referee in the world sees that, it’s a red.

If you don’t like the halftime/full time analysis just mute the TV and go make a cup of tea. If you know ahead of time that it’s going to be bad (which you seem to suggest) then why watch it? At least the BBC got rid of Adebayor after the first few weeks – he was unintelligible.

I watched the game on BBCHD and then switched over to RTE for the halftime/fulltime analysis and Dunphy, Brady and co were as scathing of the Dutch as the BBC were.

I find it hard to be too critical of Webb for this match – there were mistakes but no referee will get everything right all of the time. So he booked a lot of players but they deserved their bookings.

Maybe people should be more critical of the players and coaches that seem to have no problem with overly aggressive tackling, snarling at the referee or diving (going down to easily as the pundits put it). That’s what’s ruining football for me..

All I was trying to say was that I wasn’t as annoyed about Holland’s aggressive tactics as much as I was about the coverage of the final. I still found it very entertaining.

It was supposed to be a bit controversial – I’m didn’t want to just follow everyone else in saying how disgraceful Holland’s tactics were which “ruined” the final.

The thing that “ruined” it for me was listening to the opinions of the boring idiots on the couch.

With regards to Kevin’s comment about de Jong and van Bommel; van Bommel could’ve actually been sent off every game this tournament and should probably have gone on Sunday but de jong’s kick at Alonso was probably just appalling timing. No more than a yellow card.

Ok so Howard Webb didn’t actually have a decent game I’ll concede that. You say, Micheal that he went over the top for booking 7 players and sending Heitinga off but what do you think he should’ve done instead? All seven cards were given for, if I remember, perfectly bookable offences? If he didn’t book the players surely that would’ve just encouraged them to foul more?

In the end we were still blessed with an excellent goal and if we’re honest finals are never that exciting…

But at the end of the game, you have to admit the dismissals of De Jong and/or van Bommel in the first half may have really added to the overall enjoyment of the game.

Holland were thuggish, taking the two main culprits (if that had happened in the PL both would’ve been gone) might have changed the game for the better.

Regarding the commentary, I think Callum is trying to pull the blame onto them rather than the Dutch’s foul play. The coverage, as usual, was very bad, but the match was tarnished by one thing and that was the incessant fouling.

Holland absolutely were disgraceful, Inter didn’t need to do this sort of fouling against a higher technical side.

There are fouls and then there are fouls,
what holland were intent on doing were neither, they were MMA-lite

Get over it, more than the punditry its the dutch fans/press that are annoying me even more for even supporting this stupid shit.

Listen to what Cryuff has to say, kid.