Too easy to blame the man in the middle
IT'S far too easy to get into the habit of blaming all of your football woes on the man in the middle.
Just a few weeks back, the referee got it wrong when he allowed the now-infamous beach ball goal against Liverpool to stand.
Not too surprisingly we weren't shouting from the rooftops back then because the decision had gone our way, so maybe we'd do well to remember that when the crucial ruling went against us this weekend.
This time there was no giant inflatable for the man in black to ponder on.
No, the bone of contention this time around was Tottenham Hotspur goalkeeper Heurelho Gomes, and whether or not he should have been on the field at the end of the 90 minutes.
Match official Kevin Friend should have already awarded a penalty against Gomes for a foul on Darren Bent, before he pointed to the spot on 52 minutes for another foul by the keeper on his former team-mate.
Afterwards Sunderland boss Steve Bruce slammed the ref for not sending off Gomes, and to be fair it's hard to argue with his view that he denied Bent a clear goal-scoring opportunity and that he was the last man – by the letter of the law, a red card.
Mr Friend though opted to show the Brazillian stopper a yellow instead.
Of course, we still had the chance to level from the penalty spot but Bent, in his first game back at White Hart Lane since his summer move, fluffed his lines.
I have to say apart from that, the Black Cats' striker was in good form and deserves a lot of praise for his workrate, especially as he spent much of the encounter as the lone frontman.
And to be fair, he must have done enough to impress watching England boss Fabio Cappello, who has called him into the squad to face Brazil this weekend.
But the question is, would the spot-kick have been saved had Gomes received his marching orders, and ex-Black Cats keeper Ben Alnwick come off the bench?
Then you have to wonder if Alnwick would have saved the shots which followed from Steed Malbranque, and the header by Michael Turner.
Just as disappointing as the defeat on Saturday was the injury to keeper Craig Gordon.
Gordon fractured his arm in a clash with Jermain Defoe and now faces another lengthy spell on the sidelines, just as he looked to be hitting his best form yet in a Sunderland shirt.
His absence is a real blow for the Black Cats squad.
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Weather for South Shields
Thursday 24 May 2012
Today
Sunny spells
Temperature: 9 C to 20 C
Wind Speed: 9 mph
Wind direction: North east
Tomorrow
Sunny
Temperature: 8 C to 19 C
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Wind direction: East
