i was just looking at the match result for Athletico Bilbao v Villareal and noticed there were 9 bookings during the match .....7 for Athletico ..2 for Villareal ..

i then checked the other matches on saturday and sunday ...a total of 45 yellow cards and 3 red cards , thats seems an awful lot to me for one weekend ...is Spain really bad for dirty play and is this a normal occurance or is this just an unusual weekend ..

Never really wondered this question, but what it's true is that spanish refs are terrible, I'll always say that. Besides, refs here are a bit harder than in the premier, which is good sometimes (won't tolerate dirty stuff) but bad other times (since they stop the game more often than in the premier).

I reckon its on an average with the english premiership. There are bad weeks and good weeks

Yeah the refs in Spain really are terrible, they give yellow cards for absolutely everything, Cantalejo is one of the worst, every game I see him as ref he gives so many unnecessary cards.

And as for the 9 yellows, Bilbao are probably the dirtiest team in the league, theyre a lot like Bolton in England with the way they play

Don't think Spanish football is as 'dirty' as the Premier League, but a different kind of game is played.

If a Spanish referee refereed an English league game not sure how many players would be left by the end of it. The Spanish game is more of a passing one, and players will block runs more often, leading to yellow card. In England most bookings are for tackles, and yellow cards are issued where there well could be red ones in Spain

You again watched this game and listened to the guy saying they are alot like Bolton

I watch Spanish football every weekend, Bilbao are on quite a lot so ive gotten used to their long ball & quick closing down style. And as I said before, they use the same intro commentary for every game, you'd think they'd make an effort to learn a few extra lines about the clubs every now and again!

Good choice of watching football.

Hey don't complain, at least they say something. It's worse to watch english football on a spanish TV channel. They are like: "Oh it's Bolton... their shirts are white... oh look, Ivan Campo plays there"

The main difference is than in England refs talk to the players, whereas here in Spain they book for nothing.

Another crazy ref today in the Real Madrid game!! Alvarez tackle on Robben was terrible and was lucky not to break his leg but the other two as well as most of the bookings in the game were just stupid from the ref, no need for them at all.

It's a bit like England all the refs and LFP are biased towards teams. Like the goverments club Madrid everything goes infavor of them and just like in England with Man Utd, everything goes against Barca.

Barcelona arnt unfairly treated, you justy have to look at the penalty zaragoza got given against them a few weeks ago, it was never a penalty!

Yea, like Messi's goal in the penultimate game of last season...

Yes, the blatant hand ball which could've won the league for Barca.

Just the hand Ruud used a few weeks ago

Haven't got a clue what you're talking about.

It is http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zq8u5pXv66c

Never touched his hand...

No......touched his leg........

Yeah, he shinned it.

Are you blind? He hits the ball with hand and arm and for this reason the ball goes to the direction that goes. The hand of Messi was hand and it was too.

Yeah, sure it does...

I didn't see it, but maybe my eye isn't as sharp as yours... i'll have to take your word for it.

Sorry if I was too rude saying are you blind.

If you think that it wasn't hand then is the first person that I hear that says it, it was like if he was playing volleyball and hit the ball to pass it to Raul.

That match ended 3-1 anyway...
How about Eto'os hand against Valencia last week? and we could go on forever... Both Madrid and Barsa have been helped in some parts of the season, I think it's stupid to think there's any kind of complot.
And the political issue is just laughable, our president is a declared fan of Barsa

Your president was pictured with the head of the Referees board this week wearing a Real shirt!

Both Real & Barca get a lot of decisions their way, its the same with the big teams in England, the top 4 always get the decisions