Thomas Frank: players’ behaviour towards officials needs to be coached
Ahead of his side’s fixture away to Wolves on Saturday, Brentford manager Thomas Frank has encouraged the wider footballing world to look at the way players approach those officiating the game.
English football has seen a number of high profile incidents involving both players and match officials in recent weeks, including an 8-game ban for Fulham’s Aleksandar Mitrović after he appeared to push referee Chris Kavanagh in an FA Cup tie against Manchester United.
Last weekend saw Andy Robertson involved in an altercation with linesman Constantine Hatzidakis. The Scottish left-back claimed at the time to have been elbowed in the throat by the official but the matter has now been settled after a private conversation between the pair.
Robertson came under considerable criticism for his roll in the incident, in which he seemed to be the aggressor. He appeared to grab Hatzidakis before crying foul at an ostensibly small reaction.
Frank didn’t talk about specific cases but was keen that clubs and should encourage better behaviour between all parties, while acknowledging that his own record in doing so was not blemish free.
He said: “In general we need to be aware of how we behave out there. I try to behave in the best possible way. I am not perfect – I have definitely done my bit in the past.
“There’s so much emotion in this game. So sometimes it can be difficult to control it. Everyone can potentially do something that is not their proudest moment.”
Frank added that he felt players should be coached as to how to address referees and their opponents, claiming that rugby union was the benchmark on both counts. He described the experience of listening to a ref mic during a Six Nations game as “mind blowing” because of how polite everyone was.
Frank conceded that emotions always seemed to run higher in football than most other sports which exacerbated the problem.
He also admitted that disrupting your opponents’ rhythm was an important part of football that wasn’t always exercised with the ball. He pointed to Real Madrid employing such tactics despite being 1-0 up against English opposition on more than one occasion this season.
“I think everyone wants to be smart. Then there’s someone who wants to go even further.
“Everything is on camera these days. We need to beware and still have the emotions in the game and still be able to complain about decisions. But this is a thin line,” he said
Frank’s comments came as many Manchester United fans were unhappy with the conduct of some Sevilla players in their 2-2 draw on Saturday night.
Gabriel Montiel went down holding his face and medical staff were called onto the pitch to treat the Argentinian full-back despite there appearing to be minimal contact from Wout Weghorst. The score was 2-0 in United’s favour at the time.
BT’s commentary team speculated that Sevilla were trying to run down the clock as their away form was so poor that they considered 2-0 a good result. Robbie Savage and Ian Darke also claimed Sevilla were trying to frustrate United as the home side were in the ascendency and pressing for another goal.
There were no complaints from Manchester United about the conduct of their opponents.
