Ring Around the Ref'ree

Chelsea defeated Manchester City 3-1 in the EPL (Suck it, Barclay's!) in the billionaire version of Human Battle Bots. Roman Abramovich's expensive bot parts Ricardo Carvalho, Frank Lampard and Nicolas Anelka all scored for Chelsea while the shiny new Manchester City bot part Robinho scored in his debut on a free kick. Citeh held on in the first half but the Chelseabot just had too many parts, for now.

By the end of the match most of the excitement was gone, that is until England's Brave John Terry earned himself a red card and an automatice suspension for next weeks Manchester United match. (Video at approx. 3:00). True to form, Chelsea surrounded the referee to complain about the decision. Although, it does appear a little unjust as Terry was not the last man on the professional foul. Chelsea will likely appeal.

The appeal, though, will likely be unsuccessful according to Times Online.

It is understood that Mark Halsey, the referee, deemed Terry’s block on Jô, the City striker, to be serious foul play rather than a professional foul and he faces a three-match ban, ruling him out of matches against United, Stoke City and Aston Villa. The FA is unable to downgrade cards from red to yellow, so Chelsea must demonstrate that Terry should not have been booked to get the decision overturned, an unlikely proposition.

JT looks likely to miss the Red Devil match, but what of the Respect Campaign? You might recall that the League has initiated a campaign to increase the respect towards match officials from the players as a result of the proliferation of team protests and remonstrations surround the referee.

Much of the finger pointing has been directed at Chelsea for circling the refs, although it must be noted most clubs seem to have followed suit, including Man U and Liverpool.

As the pictures in the post demonstrate, much of the criticism is deserved. Even though, EBJT has said he supports the campaign.

The campaign may succeed eventually, but I suspect well soon be finding Chelsea players surrounding the houses of referees' with their SUVs, probably parking in handicapped spaces as well.