Journalist left fuming over ‘unwritten rule of football’ after suspected leg break for Isak

Liverpool have been dealt a sickening blow with the news that Alexander Isak has suffered a suspected broken leg, and the manner in which it arose has left one journalist fuming.

On Sunday night, it emerged from reports by Paul Joyce in The Times and David Ornstein for The Athletic that the 26-year-old is set for a lengthy injury layoff after being on the receiving end of a wild challenge from Micky van de Ven in scoring the Reds’ opener against Tottenham Hotspur on Saturday.

There were seven yellow cards and two reds dished out by John Brooks in that fixture, and although the Dutch defender was one of those booked, it wasn’t for the tackle which has now had serious consequences for the Sweden international.

Journalist fumes over lack of sanction for Van de Ven

As the news of a suspected leg break for Isak emerged late last night, Liverpool-focused journalist David Lynch was left seething at how the Spurs centre-back got away unpunished for his challenge on our number 9.

The reporter posted on X: ‘There’s an unwritten rule in football that, if an attacker gets a shot away, the defender is given carte blanche to challenge them how they like. That was a really poor and late one from Micky van de Ven yesterday and this is the consequence, yet it wasn’t looked at.’

Isak now faces a long road to recovery as Van de Ven unpunished

Lynch raises a quite pertinent point in the wake of Isak’s devastating injury blow, and Frank Leboeuf on ESPN FC also called for the Spurs defender to receive some punishment because of the repercussions of his wild lunge.

Liverpool fans have drawn parallels between that incident on Saturday and Jordan Pickford’s cowardly tackle on Virgil van Dijk in October 2020, an atrocity for which the Everton goalkeeper went unpunished as the passage of play was rendered moot by the Dutchman being offside in the build-up.

Footballers are obliged to show a duty of care to one another on the pitch, and when a player makes a leg-breaking challenge, they shouldn’t get off scot-free because of a technicality or a misplaced belief that the incident is deemed irrelevant because of a goal being scored, as was the case on Saturday.

We don’t want to advocate a witch hunt against Van de Ven, who may well be feeling huge remorse over his lunge on Isak, but at the same time it’s not right that he’ll get to play in Spurs’ next match and Dominik Szoboszlai is suspended against Wolves because his fifth booking of the Premier League season was for apparent dissent after childish provocation by Richarlison.

Lynch and Leboeuf are right to be appalled over the lack of any sanction for the perpetrator in this incident, with Liverpool’s number 9 now facing a long road to recovery because of one reckless action for which the culprit will bear no punishment.

We can only wish the Swedish striker well in his convalesence over the next few months, and his eventual return to the pitch will be a welcome sight whenever it happens.

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