Personally there’s no denying that Materazzi is a thug, however in this incident nobody can be sure that his intention was to hurt his opponent. Bresciano still had the ball and immediately chipped it across the field as soon as Materazzi confronted him with the tackle. It’s so difficult to interpret what were Materazzi’s intentions were due to the incident occurring so quickly.

Although what is not difficult to see if you look at the replay carefully, the Australian player had avoided a potential collision and barely looked like he had been hacked down physically. I’m not saying that a player shouldn’t be allowed to avoid a collision if he senses one is about to happen and initially Bresciano did manage to dodge over Materazzi’s body. But suddenly, as Materazzi crashed into Zambrotta, Bresciano then throws his entire body onto the ground and exaggeratingly roles on the grass about several times as if to indicate he had been seriously hurt.

Now it is one thing to avoid a challenge, but was it really necessary to collapse spectacularly like a sack of potatoes if you’re not genuinely hurt? Again, if Grosso is purported to be a cheat then what about Bresciano’s theatrical efforts that contributed getting a player expelled from a match, hence gaining an unfair advantage? If this isn’t a gross example of double standards, then what is?

Nice one, mctalian!

I remember that the US had that big goon they call “Gooch” covering Toni, and “Gooch” had to resort to constant fouls to “handle” (as the announcers called it) Toni.

The US was no match for Italy from a technical standpoint, so the resorted to dirty tackle after dirty tackle. They’d aim for Italian ankles, and then complain when the Italians went down. No $&*# they went down, the US would go down too if the Italians were aiming for ankles.

Then, De Rossi got some payback, intentionally or not. Unfortunately, it was on the only US player that was having a somewhat clean match.

That “Gooch” guy though… man. I still get angry about him. The announcers were kissing his @$$ the entire time, talking about how he’s containing Toni, meanwhile, he’s basically fouling like it’s the NBA.

That one is even more obnoxious. US fans felt that red cards against their players were not warranted (well, the one red card and then Pope’s second, incredibly stupid 2nd yellow). So, if you ever feel like presenting the argument against this one, it’d be just as good of a read.