Mike Dean appeared to have a decent game yesterday afternoon but I have to say that whatever way I look at it I find it amazing that Aston Villa ended the game with eleven men after his refusal to show a second yellow card to Cissokho for a second foul on Mo Barrow.

It looked for all the world that Villa would be playing with reduced numbers when he bought down the Swansea wide man having been booked for a similar challenge in the first half. But the referee chose to just have a strong word with the player and he was left to fight another day - or at least another challenge.

What is of course potential poetic justice was the fact that the Swans scored from the resulting free kick when Fernandez bundled home but that does not take anything away from Dean's decision not to show a second yellow.

It is not a decision that stands Dean alone though as all too often you see a referee decide not to show a yellow card when it means that a red will have to follow but you do have to question whether this should be the case.

The laws of the game will always suggest that a bookable offence is a bookable offence and therefore it should make no difference whether the player has been booked beforehand or not. I do get - and understand - the argument that you do not always want to see 11v10 in a game but surely that is the point of the system the way that it is in that it is supposed to act as a deterrent from another foul.

Or has it become a case that you get a yellow card and then you are almost given a free foul because of it. Of course not and thus lies another one of the problems that we have in the current game in the consistency of referees.

For me though the decision was a simple one and Cissokho should have gone for the foul Barrow although ultimately it made no difference to the outcome.

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