That penalty encapsulates everything wrong with football today.
It was the sort of tit-for-tat 'grappling' in the box you get at every set piece. Traditionally, attackers would shrug it off. It's minimal and very brief contact. It should never be a penalty.
But here's where it goes wrong.
Most of the time, attackers still do make nothing of it. It's just the nature of football. In those situations, refs don't even think about giving a penalty.
Yet when cheats - like Rodri today - throw themselves theatrically to the floor, refs will often reward the cheating by giving a penalty.
The message it sends out is that if you dive and cheat, you're far more likely to get the ref's decision than if you don't. So it encourages players to cheat and dive.
