Manchester United: A Writer's Take on Wayne Rooney's Controversial Elbow

It probably says as much for the calibre of football we’ve witnessed as the offences and injustices, but this season seems to be as preoccupied with refereeing decisions and controversies as the games themselves.

And so it was for the last week, as the opprobrium resulting from Wayne Rooney’s elbow on James McCarthy dragged into the weekend, despite Manchester United being embroiled in two of the biggest games of the season.

While the offence undoubtedly merited a red card, a charge of violent conduct and the three-game suspension that would have ensued, the level of public outcry was still astonishing. As ever, rival fans reaction was to race for the laziest of clichés, "United bias."

The issue of United bias is a popular theory, but one which doesn’t hold up to close scrutiny. Just last season, the FA imposed a retrospective four-game ban on Rio Ferdinand for his elbow on Craig Fagan, one game of which was implemented for a "frivolous" appeal.

Hardly the actions of a body supposedly favouring the club?!

Given Rafael’s sending off at Tottenham and the nature of Birmingham’s equaliser at St. Andrews, Manchester United certainly haven’t been getting favourable treatment. Last season’s league was decided by a mere point and the pivotal games against Chelsea were both lost to goals which resulted from the errors of officialdom.

It seemed a given that if Rooney was wearing any other jersey, the FA would have taken retrospective action.

Even if Mark Clattenberg’s embrace of Rooney was decreed as the referee dealing with the situation, there is a precedent of the FA revisiting cases which already been punished by the officials. In 2006, Ben Thatcher’s elbow on Pedro Mendes was declared worthy of just a yellow by the referee, yet an eight-game ban was applied to the left back.

While Rooney’s elbow was undoubtedly cowardly and dangerous, to compare it with Thatcher’s is sensationalist in the extreme.  

Giving Rooney a three-game ban would have been the rightful course of action, but it would have opened up a considerable can of worms for the Football Association. A review of the action in any penalty area in the four divisions of football league this weekend would have seen many an elbow thrown around with abandon. While none may have been in Rooney’s league, let alone Thatcher’s, revisiting the incidents would put huge pressure on the governing body as well as displaying a lack of faith in their referees.

The performance of referee Martin Atkinson in Tuesday's encounter at Stamford Bridge drew the ire of Sir Alex Ferguson, but it was hard to empathise with the Glaswegian. While David Luiz should undoubtedly have been sent off, Wayne Rooney shouldn’t have been in a position to take the field, let alone score United’s opener.

Given his subsequent anonymity at Anfield, there’s a foreboding sense of karma over his failure to be punished for the elbow.

It will be interesting to see if the last game of his hypothetical ban carries more misery for United, this time, it’s the quarter final of the FA Cup on Saturday against Arsenal.