I know it's been a while...
Anywho, everything I read about futbol, says that the diving is the biggest thing holding soccer back from catching on in the US. Personally I don't have a huge problem with it. I equate it to a lineman pulling a jersey on the offensive line, or Lebron taking 3 steps. It's up to the refs to call the game. If they see a player dive give them a card, if they see a foul, call the foul. If people are diving and they are calling fouls on the contact, that's the refs fault.
But alas, I have a solution.
They play the World Cup (and possibly other fixtures)under the rules of Fair Play. Which means that if someone is down on the turf, regardless of who has the ball, it should be played out of bounds, and given back to the team who had posession. Well, that's fine and dandy. But it's not really fair when the injured just takes a minute to get some cold spray and comes back into play.
So here's the fix: Let's say Zidane goes down on and is pointing to his shoulder. If France has the ball and plays it out, or if France points to Italy to play the ball out, then Zidane has to come out. And that's one of their 3 subs. And if they've already used all 3, then they can't play the ball out.
But you say, what if someone just got the wind knocked out of them and they need a minute? Well, if you want to stay in the game, you've got to tough it out and get back up. Basically, if you go down and stay down, you're coming out.
You say what about Fair Play? Well it's not fair to call out the stretcher and waste 2 minutes, and then hop off the stretcher and come back to play. In or out. Poop or get off the pot.
