Has showboating gone too far?

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Following recent criticism levelled at Barcelona’s Neymar, and West Ham star Dimitri Payet, we explore the ever-dividing concept of showboating.

A fan favourite when your team is winning, and a step too far when you are the butt of the joke, showboating has grown in popularity over the last decade, with players like Ronaldinho, Cristiano Ronaldo and Ricardo Quaresma paving the way for a generation of players to indulge in the fanciful.

Flair and skill has always been synonymous with the great Brazilian sides of years gone by, but with shows like Soccer AM providing a platform that transcends league and status, players can claim fame, and a piece of the fans hearts, over-night with a popular segment of the show dedicated to those with a penchant for the extravagant.

Whilst everyone enjoys watching a player produce trickery that completely dumbfounds the opposition, there is an increasing tendency for players to be perceived as taking it ‘too far,’ with Barcelona star Neymar the latest to fall foul of this criticism.

Neymar was seen to be provoking newly-promoted La Liga side Leganes in the closing moments of Barcelona’s comprehensive 5-1 victory. The game was easily won, and the score-line had done enough to embarrass the Spanish minnows, but Neymar continued to preach the overly-flamboyant, as he performed step-over after step-over, and threw in a rainbow flick for good measure, causing a Sky Sports commentator to exclaim that “this isn’t a football ground, it is a circus ring.”

Whilst impressive and easy on the eye, the decision to perform these tricks at a stage in the game when his team had already humiliated the opponent on the score-sheet, as opposed to when the scores were level, is seen by many as the ultimate insult.

West Ham players recently faced similar criticism when cruising to a 2-0 lead against Premier League opponents Watford. Dimitri Payet had already produced a magnificent assist with a rabona to double the Hammers lead, when one too many tricks from the Hammers players enraged the Watford set-up.

Showboating? West Ham United’s Michail Antonio celebrates scoring their first goal with Dimitri Payet and Winston Reid

Watford captain Troy Deeney took no exception to the piece of magic performed by the West Ham playmaker, as it was genuine mastery at a reasonable score line, but after West Ham’s second goal, Deeney, in a refreshingly honest interview with BBC Radio 5 Live, felt “they were trying to mug us off a little bit.”

The striker stated: “You can appreciate good skill and that was great skill for the second goal but as a professional you cannot allow someone to do that to you.

“You see that in the playground with six- and seven-year-olds and we are grown men. There were some harsh words said to each other and everyone had that fire in their belly again.”

Watford went on to win the game 4-2 in a fantastic turn around spurred by the actions of the West Ham players. But, despite the final result, Deeney’s words have great resonance.

These players are professionals after all; this is how they make their living. No player wants to become the butt of a joke that the whole world is laughing at, even if he is being paid great sums for the privilege.

There is, however, a middle ground, in which players can produce these skills whilst the game is still a contest. Jay-Jay Okocha famously produced a rainbow flick over Arsenal’s Ray Parlour with the scores tied at 2-2, and Ronaldinho happily made a “mug” of his opponents no matter the score-line.

It is clear that no-one wants to see flamboyance and audacity removed from the beautiful game, but like every great joke, it has become apparent that timing is of the essence.