Hopefully we can shift the discussion away from the penalty/no-penalty. Regardless of what anyone thinks, the call was a penalty, Borini took it, it went in, Sunderland won. As far as Sunderland's outlook, they have a game in hand over the 3 teams above them, including Norwich, who sit on 17th place. Sunderland have a better GD than Norwich (by 4, I believe). Sunderland have 4 games left: Home to Cardiff, away to ManU, Home to West Brom and Home to Swansea. Norwich have 3 games left: Away to ManU, Away to Chelsea and Home to Arsenal. Ignoring Cardiff and Fulham for a moment (18th and 19th, respectively but only 1 point ahead of Sunderland and Sunderland has a game in hand on both), Sunderland's prospects of remaining in the Premiership next season aren't nearly as dire as they were a week ago. I don't think anyone a week ago would have thought Sunderland were going to get 4 points against ManCity and Chelsea, especially considering the Chelsea game was at Stamford Bridge. Of course, Sunderland could sh*t the bed next week against Cardiff at home and then all bets are off.
That's neither here nor there. And it's not about being selfish or generous or whatever. It all comes down to who the coach has selected to take the PKs.
What is funniest to me is how folks who have been arguing that Jozy is lousy are, in some cases, the same arguing that the call was not a PK, as if the ref's determination of whether there was a trip or not in some way reflects on Jozy's play. It only reflects on his play if he actually was able to get his foot in front of/on the sliding foot- in which case it was a very good piece of work. If not, if it was just a careless slide tackle and Jozy was planting to cut back with the outside of his right foot, then it was just "one of those things" and does not reflect on Jozy either way. He did not go down "easy" as there was clearly good contact between the players. So, really, I'm not sure what the debate adds to the Jozy discussion. It was not "simulation" on Jozy's part - unless, again, he sensed the slide and "felt" a wide step would initiate contact. In which case, he really did earn the goal and win.
Interesting thing about those photos posted earlier is Jozy isn't looking at his left foot or the defender, he is already turning his head to look where he intends to go. He didn't really have an angle to shoot at that point and the defender had overcommitted with the initial slide. I would bet he didn't count on any contact at all and at that point as his weight shifted, it wasn't going to take much. A ref could have waived it off as simply not a foul but they seem to always call them if a trailing leg, especially one to the inside, catches someone. Should have led with his right foot so that didn't happen. Wow, Sunderland might actually pull this off if they can finally play well at home.
A classic case of media BS. After countless angles of replays, they determine the official was wrong. It's a close call even with the use of the perfect slo-mo shot and to criticize the official who has only one angle, no slo mo and no time is ridiculous. The power of Morinho over his media whores.
I went looking for this, and what I found didn't include any replays at all. Was this the Peter Walton interview or something else?
Yep, Walton and the two other Talking Heads. Walton said real time he thought penalty and not surprised penalty was called. Watching replay he concludes no penalty. The other two guys just said it shouldn't have been a penalty. I don't think they really were ripping into the ref for the call, and Walton certainly wasn't. Just that, yes, with the use of multiple angles and slo-mo, etc., that it should not have been called.
Perhaps they don't have rights to the replays, but I would really have liked Walton to show us what he meant. The MOTD replay looked very convincing to me. At any rate, ahh, the Talking Heads ...