https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EyFn4MhvRck
It may have only been an international friendly, but Antonio Valencia and Raheem Sterling couldn’t resist fanning the flames of the Manchester United/Liverpool rivalry last night.
England and Ecuador played out a pretty entertaining 2-2 draw in Miami last night and despite an excellent strike by Rickie Lambert and an absolute thunderbastard by Ecuador’s Michael Arroyo, the main talking point was the dismissal of Antonio Valencia and Raheem Sterling for an incident in the second half.
Sterling, who had been introduced as a substitute shortly beforehand, tackled Valencia in a fairly aggressive manner on the touchline and although Valencia got up pretty quickly, he was incensed with the manner of the challenge and grabbed Sterling first by the back of the neck and then by the throat before a number of players arrived (most notably Jack Wilshere) to intervene.
When things had calmed down a bit, the referee issued both players with red cards, which, incidentally, will have no effect on their participation in the World Cup later this month.
While the tackle was undoubtedly a pretty poor one from Sterling, Valencia’s reaction was over the top and he apologised on Twitter last night, while also revealing that he had escaped without injury; he has had his leg broken before so while it doesn’t excuse his reaction it perhaps goes some way to explaining it.
I apologize to the country, my teammates, the coaching staff for the expulsion of today. But most importantly, I’m fine.
— Antonio Valencia (@7AntoV) June 4, 2014
Can’t they all just get along?
Video via YouTube/MovieTrailers
