Should Chicharito have been more honest for West Ham?

West Ham got a helping hand from Chicharito’s equalising goal, but it shouldn’t have stood. VAR would rule it out, so should the Mexican have been honest about it?

Everyone knows that Chicharito’s goal on Friday shouldn’t have stood. It was clear from the way the players around celebrated that they knew it was handball. The Fulham reactions were telling as well. So should West Ham have pointed out it was handball and had the goal disallowed.

I know that we won the match and got a solid 3 points from it, but there are 2 schools of thought on this. School No.1 is always be honest. The game depends on the honesty of players and the more integrity the better because it means fewer draconian rules. The other is do anything to win, and the referees have a job. If they miss it, it’s not your fault.

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So clearly Chicharito is school 2. He went with his hand, hopefully more by instinct than by plan, and he used it to get the ball in the net. Next season VAR will rule that out, but this year the referee and his assistants missed it. He went away celebrating and the Hammers were level.

There are some very obvious pros to this approach, mainly that we got a goal and we got the points at the end of the game. At the end of the day professional sport is about winning. Cups are the measure of success, and these things don’t have an asterix. But this wasn’t about a cup. It was three points. Is it still worth it?

Part of sport is the integrity of the players, at least it is to me. Players who know they have done wrong but carry on make me trust less in sport as a whole. We’re the club of Bobby Moore, who applauded and celebrated Di Canio’s catch of the ball against Everton. And as someone who thinks players like Maradonna should always be remembered in a grey zone, because of his blatant cheating with the ‘Hand of God’, I don’t think Chicharito should not have celebrated.

It’s obviously easy for me to say this at a time when we’re not in danger, or really pushing for anything. But I don’t think we should celebrate a goal that is so obviously wrong. An offside call is marginal, and a player can’t really know one way or another. But that? Chicharito can know. Maybe it’s why I’ll never exceed in sport, but he should have called it in himself.