Dive, Dive, Dive!

It`s not a reference to a Second World War submarine film but that of a number of Sheffield Wednesday players who dived during their weekend win over Peterborough United!

Sheffield Wednesday 2 - 1 Peterborough United
Location: Hillsborough
Date: 3rd November, 2012
Attendance: 22,406

Both teams headed into this match on backs of convincing wins but it was a very poor match between two very poor teams! Should either team continue to show this sort of form for the rest of the season, they will be lucky to escape relegation.

Wednesday conned both the referee and his assistant on many occasions during this match as they dived to gain free-kicks. On one occasion, a big Wednesday defender was heading towards his own corner flag as he was being challenged by little Danny Swanson. He had nowhere to go so decided to shoulder barge Swanson and fall down at the same time to con his way to a freekick!!

Why can`t the officials wake up and smell the coffee and see what is really happening??

On two other occasions Wednesday players dived in the Posh penalty area, blatantly looking for a penalty, but the referee waved away their appeals and had words with the Owls players in question. They should have been booked for diving though but these were just some of the decisions the referee bottled during the match as he favoured the "bigger" home team!!

Posh had no urgency about them whatsoever and were frustrating to watch. At times, they had chances for a quick break away following corners from the Owls but players such as Tomlin and Little just jogged with the ball!! Why??!?

The midfield offered very little creativity and the forwards were poor. When Posh play with Boyd and Tomlin supporting Berahino, both Boyd and Tomlin need to be on-form. Unfortunately neither player was anywhere near on-form!

Was Boyd still feeling the effects of the knock he picked up during the mid-week win over Derby? If he was, he should`ve been rested or started on the subs bench. In Danny Swanson, Posh have a player capable of causing problems for the opposition and should be able to fill in for Boyd.

As for Tomlin [pictured below], he seems to have slipped very easily back into his old ways and, in my opinion, should drop back down to the subs bench for Tuesday`s tough match away at Brighton.

As for the match itself, there was very little to cheer about in the first half. The only real incident of any note was an extremely poor challenge by Ross Barkley on Kgosi Ntlhe. Once again the referee bottled it and only issued a yellow card when Barkley should`ve been heading to the showers! Whether this tackle contributed to the later injury which saw Ntlhe stretchered off is open to debate but credit must go to Jay Bothroyd. Whilst Ntlhe was on the floor, he came over from the other end of the pitch to help out and held Ntlhe`s hand whilst his leg was worked on. He also got in touch via Twitter on Sunday to find out how he was. Credit also goes to the player involved in the tackle with Ntlhe for going into the Posh dressing room to check on Ntlhe. The tackle was fair and the player could not be blamed for the injury which has still not been identified.

The second half itself was only about 9 seconds old when Wednesday went ahead from the man who should`ve been sent off in the first half - Ross Barkley!! It was a well struck effort which took a nick off the defender and into the top corner of Bobby Olejnik`s goal. A second goal soon came with a diving header from Llera.

Many Posh fans thought it was game over as their team had failed to create any real opportunity all game but they did get themselves back in the game following a corner which caused havoc in the Wednesday defence which saw George Boyd stab the ball home.

Game On! Well, it should`ve been but Posh went back into slow motion mode again and failed to create anymore clean cut chances.

Posh should`ve looked to change formation as it clearly hadn`t been working in this game and if Barnett had come on to partner Berahino up front, it may have made a difference. Unfortunately, Fergie stuck with the same formation but took any threat Posh could pose by taking off Berahino and replacing him with Mendez-Laing who played more like a winger than a forward in the time he was on the pitch!!

Fergie was obviously disappointed at the end of the game and has said every match from now on would be a Cup Final for Posh!

Let`s see how Posh do on Tuesday to see if his comments have had any impact on the players.

DON'T FORGET YOU CAN VOTE FOR YOUR MAN OF THE MATCH. You can cast your vote on the right hand side of the page. The result will be announced on Wednesday [7th November, 2012].


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