Referees this season.

[shelfmonkey]

Now, on occasion in the past I've gone off on one about the poor standard of officiating in some of our matches, but this season, particularly at Wembley, it's been the worst I've seen, from penalty decisions not being given, offsides given against us and not against opponents, persistent fouling on our players, non existent fouls given against us to the blatant time wasting this weekend. Wtf is going on? We very rarely get the rub of the green when it comes to referees/linesmen (or ladies) and when I see the scum get a win from a dubious last minute penalty I just wonder why we don't get decisions like that going our way. Thoughts please.

 

[Everlasting Seconds]

The refs have been overall rather poor this season.

 

[Spurrific]

"It all evens itself out", except it definitely doesn't for Arsenal, Manchester United, Manchester City, Liverpool or Chelsea.

 

[dude573]

Is this for the league or everything? As we have got lucky with two offside calls in the Champions league this season.

Aubameyang's disallowed goal at Wembley and Trippier being offside for Alli.

 

[Gb160]

Is this for the league or everything? As we have got lucky with two offside calls in the Champions league this season.

Aubameyang's disallowed goal at Wembley and Trippier being offside for Alli.

There was an offside in the build up for BD's goal against us at Wembley.So even if these decisions were correct we' have still won the game.

Its bullshit that it all evens out, admittedly every team gets a bit of luck occasionally, but some teams seem to get a shit tonne of it.

 

[wlhatwhl]

Poch is very restrained when decisions go against us. Other managers, no names but we all know who they are, go ballistic and make the perceived mistake a feature of their post-match press conferences. The media are full of it for days with the referee in the spotlight which ensures that all referees are wary about giving close/controversial decisions against those teams for fear of becoming the next official to be in the full glare of the media.

 

[tooey]

The past 2 years we've had more go in our favour than against us, this year we've been a bit unlucky at times with decisions not going in our favour. That's the way the cookie crumbles.

 

[Univarn]

Generally my opinion is if we're playing as good as we can then the refereeing shouldn't really matter because we have the skill to dominate so completely. Obviously particularly atrocious refereeing makes this difficult but we had more than enough time and skill to get results and we just haven't. So far we've been stuck in 2nd (or 3rd) gear which makes us much more reliant on 50/50 calls and victimless refereeing.

I will say Dele has been hit by the perfect storm this season. Clearly his diver label has been floated into refs ears as they're much more cautious to give him anything that's not 100% eyes on easy call. That seems to have been coupled with the Hack-at-Dele strat teams have taken which means he is being fouled disproportionately more and getting calls disproportionately less.

(Generally though I feel the refereeing quality this season across all matches has been incredibly erratic)

 

[Dinghy]

Don't know if this has been posted anywhere? I thought this was a nice place to put it...

Another Premier League gameweek has passed and not for the first time this season it was littered with a number of controversial incidents.

Arsenal once again needed a contentious late goal to overcome Burnley at Turf Moor, Chelsea were denied a penalty in their 1-1 draw with Liverpool, while Tottenham Hotspur were enraged at Ben Foster's time wasting as they dropped crucial points in the title race.

It's often said that refereeing decisions even itself out over the course of a season and there's a number of teams that will be hoping that is the case come May.

But which teams in the top flight of English football benefit most from decisions made by those in the middle?
Well, a new research has explored five seasons worth of refereeing decisions in the Premier League and the results show that Bournemouth are statistically the most favoured team in the division, while Watford are the least favoured.

Based on the algorithm, teams which on average occur the least amount of fouls per game, the least amount of yellow cards per game, the least amount of red cards per game and have a high game to penalty ratio will get a better score and therefore seen to get the rub of the green more often than not.

Taking the 'Big Six' into isolation, Arsenal have benefited from refereeing decisions the most. Despite Arsene Wenger complaining about a goal ruled out against Stoke City as well as Raheem Sterling winning a penalty for Manchester City this season, they have a club referee affinity level of 64.60%.
That's the best score of any of the top six teams and second across the entire division.

Furthermore, the Frenchman will be ruing the day when Chris Foy decided to retire as he was the North London club's biggest fan with a huge 74% algorithm-decided club affinity level. Interestingly across the past five seasons before his retirement, the Gunners never lost a game that Mr. Foy refereed, winning five and drawing one.

In contrast, their bitter rivals Tottenham are certainly not favoured amongst officials. With a club referee affinity of 59.78 - which is below average - Spurs are among the worst of any of their top six rivals and it doesn't appear things will change now that their best referee Howard Webb is now the Manager of Video Assistant Referee Operations for Major League Soccer's Professional Referee Organization.

The full dataset can be viewed here

http://www.football.london/arsenal-fc/news/arsenal-receive-more-favourable-refereeing-13960948

 

[shelfmonkey]

You can add Lee Mason to the refereeing love in of the scum, they've not lost a game he's refereed, ever!!

 

[PeeEyeEmPee]

just this season alone, I've learned that:

- other teams hate us
- their fans hate us
- their managers hate us
- the media hate us
- pundits hate us

and now it's referees that hate us.

once and for all can we just make a comprehensive list now, so we're not still trawling through "The PL wants us relegated", The EU are trying to cripple us financially", or "Freddie Starr ate THFC's hamster" threads in 6 months time?

 

[Hakkz]

I don't think that refs hate us specifically. I think that PL refs are awful and lack balls.

 

[midoNdefoe]

Our opponents walked off the pitch on sunday after the ref made a massive fuck up. We were 3-1 up at the time, so felt a bit like sour grapes.
Our striker went through, oppo keeper dived at his feet and handled it well outside the area - ball squirted goalwards.
The Ref blew before it went in, gave a free-kick and a yellow card?!?
Then changed his mind and gave a red AND a goal!!
Then before we could atually work out what was actually going on, they abandoned the game and reported the ref!

It is such a shame that there is a lack of refereeing quality available. I have to say, i think it is down to the players.
Every player feels it is their right, a prerequisite even, to give the ref shit! To con him at every opportunity and to give him/her the hardest time possible even when they have got the decision spot on.
Its the reason virtually no ex-players would want the role and you get the job filled by people who are not always suited to the position.

You only have to look at other sports, there is very little of this. Cricket, Rugby, Boxing, MMA - all demand respect for those officiating, any back-chat is reprimanded and strongly enforced. Why has it been allowed to slip so far in football??

Until we start recycling top footballers into refs it will forever be sub-standard shit and the most frustrating thing about the sport.

 

[Grey Fox]

Poch is very restrained when decisions go against us. Other managers, no names but we all know who they are, go ballistic and make the perceived mistake a feature of their post-match press conferences. The media are full of it for days with the referee in the spotlight which ensures that all referees are wary about giving close/controversial decisions against those teams for fear of becoming the next official to be in the full glare of the media.

This is bang on plus a lot of them are unfit or at least not fit enough for the speed of a premier league game. Madley and Moss for example rarely leave the centre circle unless there is a deadball situation

 

[Sandros Shiny Head]

The fact that Dier got booked for having a go at the ref before Foster got booked for time wasting says it all really

 

[Danners9]

In general, I think the refereeing standards are very low. Especially in the CL. The Europa League refs when we were in it were the absolute worst I'd ever seen, not seen much of the tournament this season but presume they are still bad.

Basic things like consistency, setting the tone with things like shirt pulling and time wasting early on and, you know, controlling the game like a ref should be doing. They are often slow, suckered by the players and making some really shitty calls - without much thought, three that come to mind are Ben Foster being booked on 82 mins after time wasting for an hour already, Arsenal's pen on Sunday and Niasse's 'dive' to give Everton a draw but earning him a 2 game ban.

Just not very good and games are being ruined as a result.

None of this has anything to do with how lucky/unlucky certain teams have been over X years. Making wrong decisions then doesn't justify more wrong decisions now.

That said, the VAR system in Australia's A-League has been criticised this season. Goals pulled back for incidents 30 seconds or more before the goal was scored, for instance. The right decision but put the flag up at the time. There's no rule to say how far back you can go but if the team on the field are doing their jobs, the VAR (in this example) isn't required.

 

[agrdavidsfan]

I’m sorry but the failure to dish cards out for time wasting is ridiculous

 

[shelfmonkey]

So, after another non penalty tonight, how many penalties have we been awarded this season and how many genuine appeals have we had turned down?