In and of itself, no foul. At that moment, on that match, with Jack Wilshere having been fouled a number of times already and throwing himself around the place with his usual abandon, I'd take that moment to slow things down, give everybody a chance to catch their breath, award the free-kick to Arsenal, placate Jack, tell Vincent his tackle was borderline reckless and to be careful in future and just be a soothing presence. But that's just me.
This seems like the most sensible approach to that. I think Wilshere was fouled about 5 times by then and the temperature of the game was very high as mentioned earlier. Cheers for the discussion and explanations, gentlemen.
So... now that we are all copacetic: If we see the same view MD had in the Sunday Men Behaving Badly League, is it still only a borderline foul? At U16?
Well, if you see players with Vincent Kompany's skills in the games you do even at U16, well you get a lot better games than I do. I'll just say that.
YES! Andy, that's the point I wanted to make. While we can sit here and dissect the decision in the EPL and say it shouldn't have been red, the answer for someone newer like the very eager Barciur, the answer may be, probably should be, different at the level he is likely working.
The biggest red flag with this particular tackle is that the sliding defender is coming almost straight toward the attacker. In most cases, in games I do, I would consider this inherently dangerous. Hence, even if it is a clean pick, if the attacker is wiped out, then foul and probably YC. If the attacker has time to avoid a pile-up, then all's good, play continues. Mike Dean gets screwed not just because of his angle, but because the attacker slips a quarter of a second before impact, so it looks like Kompany took him out. But you can only call what you see--it sure looks like the attacker is taken out--no replay available. So, if this exact same thing happens in one of my games, including the slip, the game would likely require a YC to the defender, otherwise the attacker's teammates would now be convinced that the ref (me) is giving them no protection. (And, they might be right, given the inherently dangerous nature of a straight-on slide tackle.)
I might quibble about whether or not this is "almost straight toward" as I think, though the players are certainly coming at each other generally, Kompany's lead leg is tackling through the ball and around/past Wilshere before he gets there. But leaving that aside, as it's probably just a matter of semantics on this particular play... What makes you label these sort of tackles, from the front, "inherently dangerous?" I would think tackles from behind, where the tackled player cannot prepare for the contact, are typically much more dangerous. And tackles from the side, which are late, can be some of the worst we see if the studs connect with a planted ankle. I think of tackles from the front as the least dangerous sort of tackle (among the possible originating directions), because the tackled player can brace himself for contact and, so long as the leg isn't raised or the boots exposed, there's not likely to be horrific contact like you might get on an achilles or an ankle. I tend to believe players mostly have a similar outlook. This is not to say that tackles from the front can't be horrendous challenges, but I think certain characteristics must be present to reach that threshold. It just strikes me that you would consider tackles from this direction "inherently dangerous," particularly considering that "endangering the safety of an opponent" is a red card offence.
I am thinking that with a slide tackle from the front, there is going to be a collision almost every time, setting aside extraordinary athleticism. Whereas, coming from a quarter, the probability of a collision is less.
The danger of a challenge is a function of the force of the collision, the (potential) location of the contact on the receiver's person, and the ability of the receiver to avoid the contact. The force of the collision is roughly the difference between the players' velocities. The ability of the receiver to avoid contact is also a matter of fair play over and above the actual danger involved. A slide tackle from behind between players running at the same speed in the same direction won't have much force, but is likely to hit a really vulnerable part of the receiver, and is really unfair because the receiver can't see it coming. A slide tackle from behind on a stationary player is probably the worst case of all. But I'd say second worst is a slide tackle from the front between players running towards each other, because the force of the collision is maximized in this case. And if you are running fast enough I'm not sure if your awareness of impending doom is of much help.