Steve bruce: Working class to no class

[Hulkster]

IT WOULDN'T have been the start of the Premier League season, I suppose, without a rant against a referee from Steve Bruce, the voluble manager of Sunderland.

The complaint was predictably tiresome, that the official had made a huge error in showing a red card to one of his players, the midfielder Lee Cattermole.

Bruce knows the score – because it happens so often. Last season Sunderland had nine players sent off, the most of any Premier League club.

They have started the same way this time, apparently without concern. “We’re from a tough working class area and the fans want a team which mirrors that,” said Bruce, by way of explanation. How come, though, that so many other clubs from similar gritty urban locations, like Everton, Manchester City, Liverpool and Tottenham, for example, do not feel they require the same mindset?

In last weekend’s match, one of Cattermole’s yellow cards was for kicking the ball away. It’s a trivial offence, but everyone in the game understands it comes with the mandatory punishment of a booking. Bruce knows this well enough. Last season, when his player Kieran Richardson was sent off against Manchester United, having earned a second yellow for kicking the ball away, he said Richardson had been “stupid”.

So, why spare Cattermole from proper blame? Why turn his verbal guns on the referee Anthony Taylor, a newcomer to the Premier League? “The last thing I want to do is criticise a young lad trying to make his way in the game,” said Bruce. “But he was absolutely awful.”

Actually, it wasn’t the last thing Bruce wanted to do. It was the first and easy thing to do, predictable and tiresome. It was also a contemptible thing to do.

http://www.dailyexpress.co.uk/posts/...s-to-no-class/