MARK HALSEY COLUMN: It's time we found a cure for football's disease

For years we’ve sat round and discussed how a foreign influence in the Premier League has made diving a growing problem in English football but we need to face up to facts and accept it’s an issue which is now deep-rooted.

On Saturday you saw Chelsea’s Willian and Diego Costa receive a caution – and rightly so – from Chris Foy for simulation in their game against Hull City. I have absolutely no problem with that decision, it was entirely correct.

But how does Chris miss the most blatant example you’ll ever see in your life from Gary Cahill, who was already lucky to be on the field after his early challenge?

This is England’s centre-half. What kind of message does it send out?

Hull boss Steve Bruce has got every right to be unhappy. The powers that be should be sitting down on a Monday morning and taking action.

There is only one real solution I can think of: Why not have an independent panel review these decisions retrospectively and make sure we are punishing the right things?

I would have an ex-referee, an ex-manager and an ex-player sat down around a table looking at every yellow card, every controversial decision, and giving their recommendation to the FA for discipline.

You couldn’t have stuffy blazer types – more people who know the modern Premier League game and the stresses and strains it puts on officials, staff and players.

It is something they do in Scotland and I feel it is the right time to look towards introducing it down here too because it is only when we start issuing a two-match mandatory ban for simulation that I think we stand any chance at all of getting it out of our game.

Wait until the owners and the chairman have to pay thousands of pounds a week for a player who is sat in the stands because he dived – then we’ll see whether or not players are doing it intentionally.

If I was Brucey on Saturday I’d have been tearing my hair out.

Chelsea’s first goal shouldn’t have stood because there was a foul by Jon Obi-Mikel on the half way line and when those kind of things are not spotted players start to lose their discipline.

Bit by bit things escalate, poor decisions are made and then all of a sudden it tips over and we see Tom Huddlestone sent off for a very poor challenge – but one out of frustration more than malice.

I don’t know what was going through Chris Foy’s mind. Perhaps the indifferent game he had last season when Chelsea played Aston Villa was clouding his judgement, but he should have managed it better.

I also think is the role of the Professional Footballers Association to get involved and help crack down on simulation.

At the end of the day their members are cheating their own. Surely they have a duty of care to sort them out or issue some kind of code of practice?

We should be issuing immediate suspensions for cases like Cahill’s and making a real example out of them; forget a yellow card – I’d scrub that and issue the ban.

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CONSIDERING the kung-fu kicks we saw in the Manchester City v Everton game, you’d think referees would be cracking down on high challenges this weekend; evidently not.

Cheik Tiote might have been apologetic for his chest-high and studs-up tackle on Alexis Sanchez after an hour of the Newcastle v Arsenal game but that was only because he knew he had got away with it.

Lee Mason should have issued an immediate dismissal. He did not get a good view of the incident, I know, but that says more about his positioning.

I’m afraid if Lee was on the other side of the challenge, in-field where he should have been, he would have seen how dangerous that challenge really was. I’m sure that would have been followed by an immediate red card.

We certainly had our pick of controversial decisions in this game – and I’d have to say Paul Dummet’s challenge on Danny Wellbeck should have brought a red card for the Newcastle defender and a penalty to the Gunners.

The Football Association backed up Chris Foy last weekend when he sent off Swansea’s Luis Fabianski at West Ham but what was different in this case? Nothing in my view.

Dummet’s challenge was a clear denial of a goal-scoring opportunity and warranted a red card by the laws of the game – something I still argue Fabianski’s did not but you can see the double standards there.

Then I looked at the goal Arsenal had disallowed for a trip by Wellbeck on Daryl Jamaat and I couldn’t understand it. If there was any contact then it was minimal – the goal should have stood for me.

That’s three big decisions in the game and you’ve got to ask whether they were called correctly; I’d argue they have not.

Refereeing at this elite level isn’t about getting throw-ins right, or saying you get every corner spot on, it is about enforcing to laws to make sure the big decisions are correct – the ones everyone will be talking about on a Monday morning or that night on Match of the Day.

If you don’t give them the ammunition, then the critics cannot have a go.

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THIERRY Henry hung up his boots this week and what an honour it was to share the pitch with him on several occasions.

He was a pleasure to referee. Yes, he could moan with the best of them, but sometimes you’d watch him in full flow and just think ‘wow’.

You are there to do a job on the pitch as a referee but contrary to popular belief, we’re still human. When you see some of the top, top players in action, it can still take your breath away, especially when you are right behind a shot and you can see it’s going in from a mile away.

I remember seeing Alan Shearer score an absolute peach from 25 yards one season and just saying “well done mate - that was unbelievable.”

Henry is a legend at Arsenal and he gave all football fans, even the referees, a lot of great memories.

Meanwhile, Friday night games are coming to the Premier League – and I think it’s great!

I know the traditionalists would rather see football played on a Saturday at 3pm but I think we’ve got to recognise this is a different ball game now. The world wants to watch and they are willing to pay for the privilege.

As long as the fixture compilers are sensible and make sure there are no terribly long trips, I think a pre-weekend atmosphere would be much better than a Monday night.

I’ve got some sympathy for Bolton fans having to trek all the way down to Millwall – that one definitely hasn’t been thought through.

Surely it is better for fans to head straight from work on a Friday, when you’ve always got that chance of an early cut?

And even better it means you’ll be able to get back and do some shopping on a Saturday with your better half – everyone’s a winner!

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YOU could forgive an assistant missing an offside if it really was the Red Lion v The Dog and Duck – but in a match with the significance of Manchester United and Liverpool, standards have to be higher.

Mike Mullarkey failed to spot Juan Mata was offside when he scored United’s second goal, pure and simple. This is a man who has officiated at two World Cups for his country.

Some people have suggested he thought the ball came off Robin van Persie but the bottom line is he called it wrong, and in a game this big it sticks out a mile.

In the end, the distance of United’s victory masked over it a bit. But had Liverpool got back into the game, I’m sure it would have been given a passing mention.

I thought Martin Atkinson did well and as someone who reffed that game a number of times, the only thing you want is to emerge unscathed with no-one talking about your performance. In that, I think he’s succeeded.

Being in charge of a game of that magnitude takes 100 per cent concentration – you really need to be on your game.

There were a couple of things I picked up on, particularly some inconsistency on shirt pulling.

Mario Balotelli got away with one early on and wasn’t cautioned but then got done later on for something far less obvious.

We saw Steven Gerrard cautioned for grabbing Van Persie but then when Kolo Toure pulls one United player’s shirt right off his back he doesn’t get anything.

It is only a little gripe but that kind of inconsistency is what drives people mad.