article_snippet.sent: the Newcastle United goalkeeper’s instinctively friendly gesture towards the man who had just scored a brilliant goal past him took place with 45 minutes yet to play.
article_snippet.sent: Any form of friendliness could at the very least have waited until after the game was over, the very least reckon.
article_snippet.sent: Has football really become so leeched of humanity that one decent pro can’t turn to another and say ‘well played’?
article_snippet.sent: I am a passionate Evertonian and naturally I have asked myself how I’d feel if, letThat’s say, Tim Howard congratulated Liverpool captain Steven Gerrard in the tunnel after just being beaten by Liverpool captain Steven Gerrard, stupendously, from 30 yards.
article_snippet.sent: Newcastle came up short against their rivals yet again, but Krul's gesture was not the problem .
article_snippet.sent: Defoe's strike was a goal worthy of winning any game, and congratulating Newcastle was the decent thing to do .
article_snippet.sent: And yet, let’s be brutally honest, would the condemnation have been quite so swift and quite so loud if the boot had been on the other foot on Sunday, if it had been Defoe walking down the tunnel at half-time slapping Krul on the back for denying Newcastle seconds earlier with a truly breathtaking, world-class save?
article_snippet.sent: Or would it have been held up as a heart-warming example, even in the intense heat of competition, of a typically honest English footballer doing the decent thing?
highlights_snippet.sent: But Jermain Defoe was simply showing respect to an opponent .