Stand up Fulham captain Danny Murphy and take a bow for pointing out that managers have to take responsibility for the "ridiculous" and "brainless" tackles which appear to have become a weekly occurrence in the Premier League.

Murphy pointed the finger particularly at the managers of Stoke, Wolves and Blackburn, namely Tony Pulis, Mick McCarthy and Sam Allardyce respectively.

Murphy said: "Your manager dictates what your players do and how you behave. You get managers who are sending their teams out to stop other teams playing, which is happening more and more - the Stokes, Blackburns, Wolves.

"The managers are sending out their players so pumped up there are inevitably going to be problems."

Already this season Fulham striker Bobby Zamora has suffered a broken leg in a challenge by Wolves' Karl Henry, while the same player was fined two weeks' wages by his club after a brutal tackle on Wigan's Jordi Gomez.

Meanwhile, Manchester City midfielder Nigel de Jong has been dropped by Holland after his tackle last weekend broke the leg of Newcastle's Hatem Ben Arfa.

No-one wants to turn football into a non-contact sport. A full-bloodied, 50-50 tackle is one of the enduring attractions of the game.

Nor should anyone believe that dangerous tackles are more prevalent today than they were back in the 1960s and 1970s. They are not. Creative players back then were targets for a generation of defenders given licence to cause physical pain.

The tackle from behind was not outlawed. Achilles tendons were regularly snapped.

They were the days of Chelsea's Ron 'Chopper' Harris, Arsenal's Peter Storey, Liverpool's Tommy Smith and the entire Leeds United team under Don Revie, led by Norman Hunter and Johnny Giles.

It is an era often referred to as the golden age of English football. In reality, it is a miracle players such as George Best emerged with limbs intact such was the physical intimidation to which he was subjected.

Of course, there will always be the odd rogue thug and we should not minimise the duty of care a player has to fellow professionals. The point, however, is that managers had a choice then as they have now.

Sir Matt Busby never sent out a dirty side. Nor did Brian Clough. Revie, by contrast, did nothing to curb his side's physical intimidation because he knew it was an integral part of why Leeds won so many trophies.

Now take the World Cup final in July.

It turned into the dirtiest in history, with 14 yellow cards and one sending off because Holland coach Bert van Marwijk sent out his players with the express intention of stopping the more creative Spanish from playing their natural game.

'Get your foot in, get in their faces.' That was the gist of van Marwijk's team talk which resulted in, among other things, De Jong's Kung-fu-style tackle into the chest of Xabi Alonso.

In short, too many players were encouraged to tiptoe along the touchline of legality. Hardly surprising in a match with so much at stake that so many ended up on the wrong side of that divide.

Football has to do everything in its power to rid the game of tackles which have seen terrible injuries inflicted in recent times on such players as Arsenal's Aaron Ramsey and former Gunners star Eduardo.

The statistics do not do Wolves' case any favours. Already this season they have picked up 20 yellow cards and two red cards, the worst record in the Premier League. In defence of Stoke and Blackburn they have not had a player sent off in the league so far.

But when the express intention at all cost is to stop the opposition playing, with the speed of the modern game the chances of players flying into tackles in reckless fashion are increased.

As Murphy said: "Under Roy Hodgson at Fulham we were always top of the Fair Play league because he wouldn't accept talking back to the referee and he wouldn't accept stupid tackles."

If all 20 Premier League managers did the same football would be a safer place.