Sergio Busquets Booked For Diving – Video (And Fable)

There once was a midfielder boy who was bored as he sat on the pitch watching the village footballers. To amuse himself he took a great breath and sang out, “Foul! Foul! I’ve been brutally fouled to restrict my superb passing game!”

The referee came running up the hill to help the boy drive the Paul Scholes away. But when he arrived at the top of the hill, they found no Paul Scholes, and no sign of any foul. The boy laughed at the sight of their angry faces.

“Don’t cry ‘foul’, shepherd boy,” said the referee, “when there’s no foul!” He went grumbling back down the hill.

Later, the boy sang out again, “Foul! Foul! They can’t fight us fairly so they’ve resorted to nefarious means to stop our rightful domination of possession statistics!” To his naughty delight, he watched the referee run up the hill to help him drive the Pepe away.

When the referee saw no Pepe he sternly said, “Save your frightened song for when there is really something wrong! Don’t cry ‘Foul’ when there is NO foul!”

But the boy just grinned and watched him go grumbling down the hill once more.

Later, he was casually prancing around in his favoured midfield position, when somebody really did hack him down. Alarmed, he leaped to his feet and sang out as loudly as he could, “Foul! Foul!”

But the referee thought he was trying to fool him again, and so he didn’t come.

At sunset, everyone wondered why the midfielder boy hadn’t returned to the centre-circle with their ball. They went up the pitch to find the boy. They found him weeping.

“There really was a foul here! I’ve lost the ball! We’re six points behind Madrid! I cried out, “Foul!” Why didn’t you come?”

An old man tried to comfort the boy as they walked back to the dressing room.

“We’ll help you look for the lost points in the morning,” he said, putting his arm around the youth, “Nobody believes a liar…even when he is telling the truth!”

(adapted from: http://www.storyarts.org/library/aesops/stories/boy.html)