AP Interview: FIFA medical chief wants more action from refs, coaches to curb violent play

FIFA med chief wants curbs on violent soccer play

BRUSSELS — FIFA’s medical chief has watched the rise in career-ending fouls over the past two years. Now he wants referees to show more red cards and coaches to do their part in curbing violent play.

“We see more violent fouls over the whole world,” as games gain in financial importance, said Michel D’Hooghe in an interview with The Associated Press.

Ahead of an Oct. 17-18 FIFA medical congress, he has produced a DVD of some of the worst fouls committed in recent years to help get the message across to all national federations that violent play must be eliminated from the game.

“Some of the fouls send shivers down your spine. It is as simple as that,” he said. And he is looking beyond the players who commit the fouls, but also at their coaches.

“The stakes are now so high that I question the role of some coaches,” D’Hooghe said. “In what frame of mind do they send their players onto the pitch? Is all this still within the ethics of our sport?”

D’Hooghe was angry before the violent tackle by Axel Witsel last month that broke both bones in the right leg of Polish international defender Marcin Wasilewski in a grudge match between Anderlecht and Standard Liege in Belgium. Wasilewski has begun legal proceedings for damages.

D’Hooghe said such aggressive play had increased throughout much of the world.

The two worst fouls, the tackle from behind and the illegal use of the elbow, should get an automatic red card, he said. D’Hooghe is disappointed referees often fail to apply the rules.

“The referees have the key. They are the only ones who can impose an immediate sanction,” he said. “They do not do it often enough and there is a lack of uniformity.”

As chairman of the medical committee, D’Hooghe has written a letter to his counterpart at the referees committee, Angel Villar “insisting on a strict application of the rules.”

He said referees were instructed to show an automatic red card for illegal use of the elbow following the 2002 World Cup in South Korea and Japan in which 12 players sustained facial injuries. Four years later in Germany, the number of those injuries dropped to just two.

“So it is clear that such measures help,” he said.