So Thierry Henry reckons football referees should be more like rugby officials…and talk to the players. The Arsenal striker’s rant came after Spanish official Manuel Gonzales ruled out a legitimate equaliser in the dying minutes of his team’s 1-0 Champions League defeat by CSKA Moscow.

‘’I would like the game to come a bit more like rugby, because in football you cannot speak to the referee,’’ said Henry. ‘’If you try, they won’t even give you and answer. You don’t want to have a go at them – just ask them what they saw at crucial times in the game. But you’re not allowed to do that. ‘’People say that footballers should be more like rugby players and accept every decision. But they can talk with the referee. We can’t do that.’’

Let’s take Henry’s last point first. In football, if players don’t agree with a decision, they don’t so much TALK to referees as swear at and abuse them – even when they’ve got the decision 100 per cent right. You can put it down to soccer players’ comparative lack of education if you like – but I blame it on the fact that football does not give referees sufficient authority.

The football authorities must make it abundantly clear that the referee’s decision is final – and if they don’t like it, then take an early bath. It’s not only refs who can learn from rugby – it’s the entire antagonistic, bickering, moaning, foul-mouthed, spitting round-ball game that needs to learn a lesson from its vastly-more-cultured neighbour.

How FIFA and the FA continue to tolerate the disgraceful behaviour of so many so-called ’stars’ I will never know. If any form of dissent were immediately penalised with a free-kick ten yards nearer to their own goal (a la rugby), the game could be cleaned up virtually overnight. If a player continues to complain, then move the free kick another ten yards – and if that takes it into the penalty area, then award a spot-kick. A penalty for telling the ref to f*** off on the half-way line? Yes, it really could happen – but I guarantee it would clean the game up.

It’s so easy, so logical…yet the authorities just stand by and let players abuse officials willy-nilly. OK, the ref does have the option of booking dissenters, swearers etc, even sending him off if the offence is persistent. But in a game where players harangue and fire obscenities at officials as a matter of course, referees’ powers are pathetically weak. There is no way behaviour will improve until players are either sent off immediately they step out of line – or automatically receive the 10-yard penalty treatment for any form of dissent.