Man City stopper capable of falling foul to England code of conduct

Joe Hart has already shown once this season that he is prepared to speak out if feeling strongly about something and this suggests that he is one of the prime candidates to fall foul of England’s new code of conduct.

Although FA chairman David Bernstein has been quick to spell out that the launch of the code is in no way related to the actions of either John Terry or Ashley Cole, it is Cole that heads the betting to be disciplined.

Cole potentially still faces an FA charge for insulting the organisation in a Twitter rant, despite since apologising, and the new code has been created in the hope of making a somewhat complicated disciplinary system easier to understand.

The Chelsea left-back is 2/1 to be the first to be disciplined under the code and he is certainly no stranger to misbehaviour of the pitch.

Cole has not been the ideal role model in the past, not only for calling the FA “a bunch of twats”, but previously for accidently shooting a student with an air rifle at Chelsea’s training ground.

Wayne Rooney is another who is no stranger to controversy and is 4/1 to be to be punished.

However, he tends to be careful when giving interviews and the fact that he is expecting his second child may keep him out the media spotlight.

Fellow strikers Andy Carroll and Jermain Defoe are others to previously hit the headlines for the wrong reasons and can be backed at 4/1 and 8/1 respectively in this market.

But it is Hart who may be an interesting bet at 10/1, given that he has already been criticised by Manchester City boss Roberto Mancini this season.

Hart was unimpressed that his team conceded two late goals in a Champions League defeat to Real Madrid.

But Mancini responded by stating that he was judge of performance and not Hart and that it is the job of the manager to criticise, not other players.

Certainly committed to the cause as much as anyone, Hart has the personality to say something out of line if he disagrees with it and this could land him in hot water in the future.

All Odds and Markets are correct as of the date of publishing.