Hurst condemns Beckham over yellow card ploy
(Agencies)
Updated: 2004-10-13 08:51

Geoff Hurst has condemned David Beckham's ploy of deliberately picking up a booking against Wales on Saturday, saying it would have cost the captaincy had it happened in his day.

England manager Sven-Goran Eriksson promised that he would "take care" of the controversy surrounding David Beckham (pictured)'s booking against Wales later this week. [AFP/file]

"I can't possibly imagine that kind of thing happening in our time," England's 1966 World Cup hat-trick hero said. "I come from a different planet when it comes to how I feel about that."

Hurst said that had Bobby Moore, England's World Cup-winning captain, attempted something similar the captaincy would have been taken from him.

"What would (manager) Sir Alf Ramsey have thought if he said that he'd got himself booked? It was truly poor."

Hurst added: "You could argue that if FIFA had seen that, they might think it's bringing the game into disrepute.

"I would argue that it brings the country into disrepute. You tend to set a precedent if you allow something like this to go ahead."

Hurst said: "I'm disappointed about it as an ex-professional but it can't be right, whenever it happened. In principle, it's not right. It saddens me."

Hurst was speaking on Tuesday at the unveiling of a statue of Tofik Bakhramov, the Azerbaijani linesman who controversially determined that his second goal had crossed the line in the 1966 World Cup final against West Germany at Wembley.

England play Azerbaijan in their World Cup Group Six match on Wednesday. Beckham got himself booked after breaking a rib on Saturday so he could serve out a one-match suspension while sidelined by the injury.

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