By Mike Fowler
We all know that Arsenal get a lot of red cards. After all, the media do like to remind us on a regular basis and the taunts from other fans seem to reinforce this theory. Last season was a tad contentious with regards to some of those reds and started quite early on with Declan’s second yellow for “delaying a free kick” against Brighton when, being seated just a few yards from the incident, I clearly saw a Brighton player kick Rice and believed it to be a straight red. Alas that’s not how it went, and it cost us points as did other bizarre incidents.
Over the summer I therefore decided to do my best to see whether we were treated differently by referees and whether it was just us. I wondered, as others have done, whether there was a regional bias, or an anti-London bias at the very least.
To summarise, I analysed the last six seasons. Why six? Because it is a dreadfully cumbersome exercise when you have to start from scratch and so I arbitrarily decided to start with the season that ended in 2020.
I looked at the six seasons individually and collectively. It transpired that there were 13 teams who were ever present in the top division throughout that period, so I looked at averages across the 13 and how the other 12 compared to Arsenal. I also looked at the traditional “big six” and how the other five were treated (in terms of fouls, cards etc) compared to Arsenal. I Also compare the three London teams against the three from the Northwest and also how those three compared to Arsenal.
I shall go into great detail later but to give a flavour of my broad findings, I didn’t dwell on the regional bias too much as nothing really sprang out. Many southern teams faired just as well as some northern teams and some London teams faired quite reasonably and seemed to be treated no better or worse than Midland teams or some from the north. It was only when I really drilled down into the figures that the disparities began to appear.
But let’s start with the overall picture. The first table shows the number of fouls committed and cards received by each of the 13 teams that were ever present for the whole six seasons in question.
| Fouls | Y | R | FPY | FPR | ||
| 1 | WOLVES | 2,611 | 427 | 17 | 6.1 | 154 |
| 2 | VILLA | 2,531 | 456 | 14 | 5.6 | 181 |
| 3 | PALACE | 2,569 | 405 | 14 | 6.3 | 183 |
| 4 | SPURS | 2,543 | 435 | 14 | 5.8 | 182 |
| 5 | EVERTON | 2,508 | 446 | 16 | 5.6 | 157 |
| 6 | CHELSEA | 2,508 | 453 | 13 | 5.5 | 193 |
| 7 | MAN U | 2,501 | 455 | 9 | 5.5 | 278 |
| 8 | BRIGHTON | 2,485 | 401 | 16 | 6.2 | 155 |
| 9 | LIVERPOOL | 2,390 | 315 | 11 | 7.6 | 217 |
| 10 | NEWCASTLE | 2,329 | 410 | 10 | 5.7 | 233 |
| 11 | ARSENAL | 2,299 | 371 | 22 | 6.2 | 105 |
| 12 | WEST HAM | 2,284 | 355 | 13 | 6.4 | 176 |
| 13 | MAN CITY | 1,957 | 301 | 12 | 6.5 | 163 |
| Average | 2,424 | 402 | 14 | 6.1 | 183 |
As you can see, Wolves committed the most fouls and Man City the fewest…by a long way. I guess based on the amount of possession they have, that’s not unreasonable. In terms of Arsenal, the “dirty, dirty” tag seems somewhat unjustified as we commit far fewer than the average number of fouls and get far fewer yellow cards than most. In fact Villa, Man U and Chelsea are very close indeed in terms of yellow cards received so no regional bias there! Of course, the other standout figures are the number of red cards that Arsenal have received (22) against those received by everybody else but just take a look at Man U. Far more fouls, 20% more yellow cards yet Arsenal have received 144% more red cards. How does that work? We’ll look at that in more depth later.
As a slight aside but also interesting was looking at the six seasons individually and who committed the fewest fouls each season. The table above shows the averages but season by season, Man City committed the fewest fouls in four of the six seasons, Liverpool in one season and Arsenal in one season. But looking at each of those seasons individually how did things pan out?
Man City
Well in each of the four seasons they committed the fewest fouls, they also received the fewest yellow cards and a below average number of red cards.
Liverpool
In their one season committing the fewest fouls, they also received the fewest yellow cards and below average red cards.
Arsenal
Well, it wasn’t quite the same for us. Just a little different! In fact in the season we committed the fewest fouls, Liverpool received the fewest yellow cards despite committing 14% more fouls than Arsenal who in turn received 18% more yellow cards than Liverpool. Indeed, six teams committed fewer fouls than Liverpool but still they received the fewest yellow cards.
In terms of red cards, only one team, Brighton (6), received more than Arsenal (5) who were shown more than double the average number of reds (2.4)…and yes, I’m still talking about the season in which we committed the fewest fouls of all 20 clubs!
Taking a closer look at reds, there were seven teams who between them received a total of five red cards (the same as Arsenal by themselves). Those teams committed 2,941 fouls for their five red cards whilst Arsenal committed just 346. Indeed, on their own Man U committed over 100 more fouls than Arsenal (452 to 346) and received 17 more yellows than Arsenal (that’s 36% more than Arsenal), yet Arsenal received five times as many red cards. And, just to repeat, this is the season where Arsenal committed fewer fouls than any other team in the Premier League.
In the next article, we’ll delve further into the ‘big six’ and how the London 3 compared to the Northwest 3.
