THIS time four years ago an infuriated Bruce Rioch, then manager of Bolton Wanderers, asked a policeman to arrest a Derby player, Marco Gabbiadini, after his horrific tackle on Simon Coleman left the player with a double fracture of the leg.

The response of many of the leading lights in the football world to Rioch's action was predictable enough - he was regarded as a big girl's blouse and a bit of a nutter for trying to get the law involved. "It's a man's game, innit," was the gist of their argument.

John Fashanu followed a similar line in response to John Hartson's assault on then West Ham team-mate Eyal Berkovic in training four months ago. "At Wimbledon anyone who did that would have been a goner - if they had been stupid enough to show their face again at the club," he said . . . condemning Berkovic for being wussy enough to complain to the media about being kicked in the face (after his club had done nothing about the incident), not Hartson for doing the kicking.

Earlier this month Hartson was fined £20,000 (less than two week's wages - easily recoupable by selling an exclusive "It's persecution, innit?" interview to any of the tabloids) by the English Football Association and banned for three games - effectively two because he was cup-tied anyway for one of the matches included in the ban, Wimbledon's League Cup semi-final against Spurs.

"It's very steep and I'm very disappointed for John," complained West Ham manager Harry Redknapp when he heard of Hartson's punishment.

Steep? Oh Harry. Ryan Swan might beg to differ. Last Sunday he was indefinitely suspended by his club, Bermudan first division side Devonshire Cougars, with no review until the 2001-02 season, for kicking a player in the head in a game a fortnight before.

Hats off to Devonshire Cougars. If the FA had applied a bit of common sense to their deliberations on Hartson's punishment they would have given him a similar ban. Joe Kinnear, the player's current manager at Wimbledon, had, after all, asked the FA to give a "common sense" verdict. Mind you, Joe had `a slap on the wrist' in mind, not jail, which is probably where this guy belongs.

Hartson is, quite simply, a thug. So why do so many sporting authorities insist on protecting thugs like him - and why aren't they punished by the law simply because their thuggish acts take place in sporting arenas?

Not long before Hartson kicked Berkovic in the face he used a hanging basket outside a pub in Swansea as a football - he was arrested, charged with criminal damage and ended up in court. He was fined and given a conditional discharge, but ended up with a criminal record.

Now, no offence to hanging baskets - they can be very pretty indeed - but how come Hartson ended up in court for kicking a bunch of petunias in a bucket but when he kicked a man in the face the law took no interest? Why should it have mattered that he was wearing his West Ham training kit when he kicked Berkovic, but probably just an Armani suit when he squared up to the petunias?

"Well, things can get a little heated and emotions can boil over in the heat of battle," say those who want the law to keep out of sport. Mmm, things can get a little heated and emotions can boil over in the office, in the kitchen at home, or outside a pub at closing time, but that won't save the lad who kicks his mate in the face from arrest. Will it?

And if the same lad stamped on the neck of his mate, who was lying defenceless on the ground at the time (much like Scott Murray was when Martin Johnson stamped on him in last weekend's England v Scotland game at Twickenham) would the law turn the other cheek?

In truth you'd need a special supplement to list the acts of sheer thuggery committed in club or international rugby matches over the last year (hard to forget Denis Hickie's fractured jaw or Eric Elwood's split scalp after last June's Test match against South Africa, to name but two incidents).

Mike Tyson was dismissed as a nutcase after he bit Evander Holyfield's ear - what about Bath's Kevin Yates who did the very same thing to Simon Fenn of London Scottish a year ago in a cup match? Tyson is where he belongs now - in jail (granted, for non-sporting offences) - if you or me, like Tyson and Yates, bit a chunk out of someone's ear under extreme provocation (e.g. in the course of a chat with our bank manager) wouldn't we be in the same place?

Last season Alan Shearer kicked Neil Lennon in the face in a match at Filbert Street but was declared "not guilty" by the FA after they "studied" the incident on video. "I can't understand why it had to go this far in the first place," moaned then Newcastle manager Kenny Dalglish. And how far was that? The English Football Disciplinary Committee trying the English football captain?

What if Leicester manager Martin O'Neill (who said after the game: "I don't care if you are Alan Shearer or the Pope, you don't do something like that. It is not in the game. One of my players was kicked in the face and of course it was deliberate") had asked the nearest police officer to arrest Shearer and charge him with assault, which, presumably, he would have been entitled to do? How would Kenny have coped with that?

"The court is well aware that strength, agility and some measure of aggression is part of the game for both players and spectators but when acts are done which go well beyond what can be regarded as normal physical contact and an assault is committed, the court has a duty to condemn and punish."

"It has to be made clear both to players and to the public that such criminal acts cannot be tolerated on the field of play any more than they can be tolerated in any place in the country. A footballer who assaults another player on the football field is not entitled to expect leniency just because the incident occurred in the course of a football match."

So said Lord Hope, Scotland's most senior judge, in 1994 when he sentenced then Rangers' forward Duncan Ferguson to three months in prison for head-butting an opponent in a Scottish league match.

"It's a witch-hunt - there are much worse events on football pitches every week," complained Joe Royle, who had paid £4 million to bring Ferguson to Everton. Yes Joe, there are much worse events on the field of play every week (take a bow Martin Johnson), pity Lord Hope doesn't get to pass judgment on the offending thugs, and not their respective associations.