Chelsea on track to get 23 red cards this season and Arsenal to get 53 yellows.

3 Replies to “Chelsea on track to get 23 red cards this season and Arsenal to get 53 yellows.”

1. Yes, Oga(master) Tony, I agree with the point you’ve made.

   Aresnal shouldn’t be judged as to whether they’ll have a good or poor Premier League campaign this season. For, this season’s PL campaign is still in the early stage of the campaign with only 5 games played out of the maximum 38 games that will be played. And Arsenal are so far on 7 points out of the maximum 15 after playing 5 games. By exams marking, that just a pass mark result they’ve got in the first game playing test of the season. The 2nd test of the season will be conducted in week 10 of the season which will be a little past the quarter way mark into the season’s campaign. And by then Arsenal who have improved on their early season poor form but have now appeared to be in form in their recent playing in the PL could make significant progress in the table by then if they win all their next 5 PL games that includes a visit to the Goodison park to play a bogey away game against Everton.

   I do look at the League table to see where Arsenal are in it and also to see the gap between them and the clubs that are above them. And after 5 games played, both the 2 Manchester clubs who are joint leaders on the table now with 13 points each have a lead of 6 points on Arsenal. These 2 games lead on Arsenal by them is not comfortable for me. Therefore, Arsenal must try by all means in their next 5 games to close the 6 points gap between them and these 2 Manchester clubs by collecting all the 15 maximum points that will be on offer for collection in their next 5 games before things get out of hand.

2. Oliver, simply looked at the fixture and said, whatever happens don’t do anything contentious, pray I don’t have to make a penalty shout and pray nothing like a straight red that could define the game.

   So equally biased, he chose to allow the game to flow even with a number of tackles coming in that ought to have drawn a cautionary yellow. For the most part these were coming from Chelsea players early on, looking to stifle Arsenal counter, as we chose to play by and large without the ball, reversing the roles of the teams, given the pattern of recent games, the FA Cup final and last years Community Shield aside.

   However he didn’t fancy the Bridge delusional on his back so didn’t flag these up. Also it afforded him some relaxation, because I do believe the challenge by Moses on Lacazette, warranted a yellow, he was late and mistimed and miscued his challenge, resulting int he injury. Had this been flagged in turn it would have had Moses, the weak lionk, on a tightrope. Luiz should have gone for 2 yellows before he: endangered a player, whilst evidentially from the miscue, being oput of control and with his boot raised.

   I like the overhead, but this was not the time for one. By the letter of the law, this is a straight red, he see’s it, so can give a red and only a red, what is the interpretation of the yellow? The second is a straight red and thus allows Oliver to address the mistake from earlier, appear unbiased in his officiating and give the game it’s talking point. Whilst the player is still dismissed for a straight red and the context of the first challenge is not detrimental, unless you consider it within the result as a whole, due to the fact that Arsenal could and should have been a man up for 40+ mins.

   You can also suggest that this type of stance by the officials leads to more injuries and reckless endangerement as players match the tacitcs, as we chose to late on.

   Bellerin disguising the odd professional well enough (for the referee) until late on as with Kolasanic, but what this does is stem the tide, preventing Arsenal from capitalising on the red, as the shape and importance of the full backs in both attacking phases and defensive ones is inhibited, and we don’t have replacements.

   Mr Oliver has been clever here, but cunning is the lesser mimic of wisdom, it is quite obvious what he has done. He’s taken a step back.

   He first used to officiate, actually giving the bias to Arsenal, seeing the oppositions attempts at breaking up play as just that, then he went to the draws and then the defeats. He’s back at stage 2 of his career. Changes are afoot.

3. Because of our experience of referees over the last 8 or so years, our expectations are generally fairly low for the majority of the PGMOL. This means that when we have a referee performance that stops short of the blatant anti-Arsenal bias to which we are accustomed, we are inclined to judge it favourably, as it is so much better than was feared.

   Mr. Oliver’s performance at Chelsea was a case in point. Nowhere near as bad as it might have been.

   Still, a number of questionable decisions, such as awarding free-kicks whenever a Chelsea player feel over (or dived), giving a yellow card to Elneny for his first challenge after coming on, which was barely even a foul, and, most notably, not giving Luiz a red for kicking Koscielny’s head. Also, why did he feel the need to indulge the Chelsea manager and Co with an explanation for his red card decision, for which the justification was obvious), instead of just dismissing him for open dissent?