Arsenal’s Eduardo Has UEFA Ban Lifted: One Step Forward, Two Steps Back!
by Mr Neutral on September 15th, 2009 375 words | 15 commentsJustice prevails or bizarre back tracking?
Uefa has overturned its decision to ban Arsenal striker Eduardo for two Champions League games for diving.
The Croatia international was suspended after being found guilty of diving to win a penalty in the Champions League qualifier against Celtic on 26 August.
But on Monday, Uefa accepted Arsenal’s appeal and he will now be eligible to play in their opening two Group H ties.
“I’m very pleased that we have finally arrived at the truth,” said Eduardo in a statement on the Arsenal website.
“All we needed to do was to prove what happened and we have managed to do that. This decision makes me feel a lot better.
“I just want to say that I am a fair player. To score goals you must take your opportunities and I’m not the type of player who needs to be dishonest to score goals.”
Arsenal also welcomed Uefa’s decision.
“We were able to show there was contact between the keeper and Eduardo and that the decision should be annulled,” a Gunners statement said.
“We fully support the drive for fair play in football and believe it is important that Uefa provides clear and comprehensive standards that will be consistently enforced going forward.
“We are glad to put this incident behind us and concentrate on the games ahead.” (BBC Sport)
I have to say I was a little surprised at this decision. Don’t get me wrong I don’t think Eduardo is a serial offender and probably didn’t deserve to be used as a precedent but he did without doubt dive to win a penalty against Celtic so to have the ban overturned seems bizarre.
Either you do not impose the ban at all or you punish the offender. I have to admit I thought the ban may be cut to a one match offence or perhaps even a suspended sentence, which would make sense given his previous lack of diving offences, but to have the ban totally removed makes UEFA look toothless. Now when the next player is at first suspended by the European Football Governing body the appeals will rain in and the ban will be overturned. Also to change the decision just 24 hours before the Gunners are in action is also astounding.
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anonymous - September 15th, 2009 at 8:36 am
Disgrace,total disgrace.
baggins09 - September 15th, 2009 at 8:53 am
what a fucking joke just when you think there starting to crack down on cheating they undo the good work they’ve done, they’ve just not got the balls to follow it up against teams like real and utd so have had to let arsenal off for fear of a backlash about inconsistant decisions later in the season when there all at it. what a joke.
anonymous - September 15th, 2009 at 9:05 am
Ha ha
)) Miserable UEFA!!! Shame on all who works in that fucking federation!!! THERE WAS A DIVING!!!! Now it is OFFICIALLY allowed to dive for anyone who wants and NOTHING will be made by any officials.
Hey, UEFA, you are fighting for fairplay? Well, this case looks like some shitty attempt to bring fair play into the game.
Come on, forwards and strikers, DIVE ALL AROUND!!!! AND EVERYTIME!!!! Nobody will do anything.
anonymous - September 15th, 2009 at 9:17 am
WoW!!!! Eduardo said that he is “fair player” and he is glad that truth is unveiled. Shit, what a disgusting player!!!! Hope Arsenal will suffer heavy defeats throught the season, especially from their main rivals.
Arsene Wenger rised trash-player.
And after that somebody still say that Adebayor is scum??? Look at the Eduardo now. The club phylosophy is to raise scum, like Eduardo…cheaters, who will attempt a dive at any time.
Now it is most hated team for me
anonymous - September 15th, 2009 at 9:23 am
All executives and the UEFA president should resign from their duties.
All of them are now confirmed they can do NOTHING with famous teams, the organisation itself is useless. All big teams is laughing at UEFA…UEFA like rookie cop at first patrol at heavy criminal area – only has uniform, but no actions can be made. LOOOOSERS UEFA!!!!!!!
baggins09 - September 15th, 2009 at 9:33 am
its pathetic it just means if some one dives in future they can appeal it and it will have to be overturned as eduardo’s was the most blatant of dives and they can just use his case to back up there appeal so uefa have basically legalised diving, ronaldo’s gonna love this a license to dive and he doesn’t even need to make it look convincing now!
anonymous - September 15th, 2009 at 9:35 am
An event of non-importance, in a match that was of non-importance, for a dive that was of non-importance. They’ll look at those on a case by case basis in da future i hope. yawn* article *yawn.
anonymous - September 15th, 2009 at 9:45 am
Arsenal are part of the establishment so of course they overturn the ban.UEFA will wait for asmaller team to pick on and then make the ban stick.
Retryboy - September 15th, 2009 at 9:48 am
Course with the stakes so high in games players are gonna try everything they can only way to get football back to how it used to be would be for referees to let some contact go directives have to change from the top if they were not getting free kicks and penalties they would actually try and stay on their feet siiimples!
anonymous - September 15th, 2009 at 9:51 am
I’m soooooo glad that FIFA banned Chelsea from transfers
This is very good. Even big money couldn’t buy them. That is great. I think miserables at UEFA didn’t even know about those cases 
Or already are bought by big clubs.
That’s right about small clubs. If somebody from APOEL or Debreceni will attempt to dive they will be banned for 1 game
))) And after appeal the club will need just to pay the fine – 30,000 euros 
))) maximum.
anonymous - September 15th, 2009 at 10:01 am
Divings nothing new Ive been watching football for years and I cant see aything differant. Its just another way of sky promoting their channels by showing rerun after rerun.Ask Rodney Marsh if he dived in the seventies.
anonymous - September 15th, 2009 at 10:02 am
Since UEFA said that this kind of changing of referee decisions will be done for each case independently (based on infulence of national associations?), only thing that matters here is that there actually was a contact between Da Silva and Boruc. Was there enough contact for penalty, that is something that falls under referee judgement.
For the end, my scoring for Eduardo’s “dive” artistic impression are much lower than Rooney’s and CR9’s. He lacks grace of natural diver.
anonymous - September 15th, 2009 at 10:08 am
The problem with Eduardo’s case is that although he dived/possibly got out of the way (he was brutally injured after all) Boruc still made the slightest contact. Therefore UEFA cannot label it a dive, because it is possible that he lost his balance because of this – I’m not saying he did.
I am an Arsenal supporter and was fine if Eduardo got suspended so long as it was consistent. Unforuntaly the whole episode has shown how toothless UEFA really is.
footybanter.co.uk - September 15th, 2009 at 11:19 am
Bottled it completely.
Mr. Chopper - September 15th, 2009 at 12:35 pm
Nice Gang of Four reference.