Suarez reformed?

The recently concluded Copa America, which was hosted by Brazil, was significant in a number of ways. Upfront, the hosts won the tournament, beating Peru 3-1, after a gap of 12 years. There were other unexpected outcomes.

First, Brazil won the tournament without the services of Paris Saint-Germain (PSG) superstar Neymar, who was not available because he was carrying an injury. This unexpectedly benefited the home side and taught fans and managers a valuable lesson: That the presence of a superstar carrying unnecessary baggage can, in fact, destabilise a team, rather than help take it over the line. The most ardent Neymar fans will acknowledge that alongside his undoubted skills, he carries baggage that neither helps him, nor his team. That is probably the reason why PSG are trying to offload the Brazilian in this transfer season.

Another lesson we learnt is that even the most perfect of players are not perfect. Argentina and Barcelona striker Lionel Messi is not only acknowledged to be one of the greatest attacking players to grace the game of football, but has so far also been idolised as a fair and sporting competitor. But Messi’s failure to win trophies with his national team, in sharp distinction to the bags of trophies he has won with his club, has probably embittered him.

His bitterness brimmed over after Argentina’s semi-final loss to Brazil in the Copa America. Messi embarked on an extended rant, in the course of which he excoriated the refereeing, alleging systematic bias in favour of the home team. For his pains, Messi faces a ban from participating in the Copa America for up to two years. This may not prove significant given Messi’s age and the stage of his career he is in, but it is, nevertheless, disquieting to see the otherwise quiet and imperturbable Messi embark on such a harangue. 

But all these wrinkles were overshadowed by a sublime moment of hilarity. It came in the course of a match between Uruguay, the most successful team in Copa history, and Chile on June 24 . Uruguay and Barcelona striker Luis Suarez, one of the quintessential ‘bad boys’ of international football, had darted into the box, following a pass, rounded the goalkeeper and taken a shot at goal. The Chilean keeper recovered his poise in time to palm the ball away from goal.

Momentarily distracted, perhaps, by his failure to score, Suarez immediately appealed for a penalty. What he seemed to have forgotten in the heat of the moment was that it is the goalkeeper’s job to save goals and to do this he can use any part of his body: hands, feet, torso and head. Most usually, goalkeepers use their hands to parry, palm over or collect balls threatening their goal. Soon after, Suarez realised his mistake and stopped appealing.

There was more to come, however. Later in the course of the match, Suarez made frantic appeals to the referee, imploring him to send Chile’s Gonzalo Jara off the pitch. The only problem was that all Jara had done was trip up a pitch invader, which doesn’t exactly qualify as a foul.
 

This is, however, an improvement on Suarez’s on-pitch behaviour. Five years to the day from the Uruguay-Chile match, Suarez had bitten Italy defender Giorgio Chiellini in a group-stage match during the 2014 World Cup. In all, Suarez was involved in three ‘biting’ episodes: the first time was in 2010, when he bit a PSV Eindhoven player while playing for Ajax in Holland; and in 2013, he had bitten Chelsea defender Branislov Ivanovic, while in a Liverpool jersey and was suspended for 10 games.
 

This incident prompted Liverpool to sell Suarez to Barcelona, where he has not only mended his ways but turned in impeccable performances season after season as part of an attacking trio, also involving Messi and another striker who has rotated over the years: Neymar, Ousmane Dembele, Philippe Coutinho. The good news for the Catalan side is that another classy striker — Antoine Griezmann — will wear the Barcelona jersey from next season. Suarez’s happily changed ways perhaps owes much to his first Barcelona manager, Luis Enrique, who had always been a stickler for discipline.

Generically, the funniest incidents involve all manner of own goals – from misplaced back passes, by goalkeepers unaware of where the sticks are behind them, and, in one instance, from a hoofed clearance from the midway line of the ground.

But there are some outliers as well. Louis van Gaal, Manchester United manager for two years, was trying to convince the fourth official that a free kick awarded to Arsenal should not have been given because the Arsenal player claiming a foul had dived, i.e., simulated a fall. In the course of giving a demonstration of the dive, van Gaal, in fact, toppled to the ground. Strictly speaking, that was not on the pitch, though the incident involving an Eric Cantona look alike making it to the Manchester United line-up on the pitch was. The impostor was turfed out before the game began, however.

As of now, Suarez’s appeals on the pitch against Chile can be considered the lightest of moments in top-tier football.