{"id":645779,"date":"2026-05-02T22:53:09","date_gmt":"2026-05-02T22:53:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/645779\/"},"modified":"2026-05-02T22:53:09","modified_gmt":"2026-05-02T22:53:09","slug":"strikers-with-long-hair-are-a-problem-says-le-bris-after-ballard-red-for-hair-pull-premier-league","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/645779\/","title":{"rendered":"Strikers with long hair are a problem, says Le Bris after Ballard red for hair pull | Premier League"},"content":{"rendered":"

R\u00e9gis Le Bris said Dan Ballard\u2019s red card for hair pulling was \u201chard to digest\u201d as Sunderland\u2019s hopes of European football next season were dented by their draw at Wolves. Sunderland<\/a> led through Nordi Mukiele against relegated Wolves when the referee, Paul Tierney, dismissed Ballard, who was adjudged to have tugged the braids of Tolu Arokodare in an aerial duel.<\/p>\n

The red card meant Sunderland had to play with 10 men for more than an hour and Wolves capitalised, ending a goal drought stretching back to mid-March when Santiago Bueno equalised in the second half.<\/p>\n

Sunderland remain 12th in the table and Ballard faces a three-match ban that will prematurely end his season for an offence that is deemed violent conduct.<\/p>\n

Le Bris said: \u201cWe understand the rule and Paul Tierney is a great referee, but the execution of the rule is very hard to digest because I don\u2019t think it is intentional and violent conduct.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe don\u2019t want to be controversial, we are here to help the game, many people are watching the Premier League<\/a> and we want to be clean in our behaviours, but football is football. It is a duel in the air and with a tall striker [who weighs] 100kg more or less, Ballard is massive as well, so the ball in the air 20 times in a game, many things can happen.<\/p>\n

Santiago Bueno rose above the Sunderland defence to head in a corner from his namesake Hugo. Photograph: Jason Cairnduff\/Action Images\/Reuters<\/p>\n

\u201cIf the rule is the rule, when you have a striker with long hair, you will have problems because you can\u2019t defend. It was more or less the case. They executed the rule, but it\u2019s a bit hard to digest.\u201d<\/p>\n

Michael Keane<\/a> and Lisandro Mart\u00ednez<\/a> have also fallen foul of the rule this season \u2013 the former for pulling Arokodare\u2019s hair \u2013 with Everton and Manchester United failing to have the red cards overturned.<\/p>\n

Le Bris, whose side had conceded nine goals in their past two matches, will consider whether to appeal, but he was at a loss to explain how these types of offences can be avoided in future. \u201cFirst of all, we\u2019ll see who is the striker. If he has long hair, we have a problem. If they play long, be careful and we\u2019ll see.<\/p>\n

Sunderland\u2019s goal was a familiar story for Wolves, with several defenders all failing to stop Nordi Mukiele. Photograph: Jason Cairnduff\/Action Images\/Reuters<\/p>\n

\u201cSometimes a handball is the same, it\u2019s probably a grey area and with this rule we are at that stage where you have to manage the rule to make it clean for different situations.\u201d<\/p>\n

Wolves were booed off at full-time as they remained rooted to the foot of the table, while Rob Edwards\u2019s decision to withdraw Hugo Bueno towards the end in place of Angel Gomes was unpopular with fans.<\/p>\n

Edwards, who revealed Bueno had not trained much this week because of a knee problem, said: \u201cI\u2019m very frustrated, we all are. I understand the situation at the moment. We\u2019ve been relegated, we\u2019re bottom of the league, we\u2019ve drawn a game against 10 men off the back of three defeats in a row, I\u2019m going to take it.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt doesn\u2019t concern me. We\u2019ve got three more games where we\u2019ve got to get more results and we can turn things around. It will be all the more rewarding when we are able to turn things around.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"R\u00e9gis Le Bris said Dan Ballard\u2019s red card for hair pulling was \u201chard to digest\u201d as Sunderland\u2019s hopes…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":645780,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[563],"tags":[64,63,596,85],"class_list":["post-645779","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-football","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-football","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/645779","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=645779"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/645779\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/645780"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=645779"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=645779"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=645779"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}