- Arsenal advance…. but it is never likely to be enough
- Arsenal v Palace: injury latest and Palace’s performance
By Tony Attwood
There is a bit of a fuss being made about the fact that this is “Crystal Palace’s 29th game of the season.” And it is interesting because there is not much comment about how many matches Arsenal have played.
Place have in fact played three more games than Arsenal in this campaign, first because of the Community Shield dmatch before the league kicked off, and then two more games than Arsenal because Palace are in the Uefa Conference League and indeed they do get a couple more games in the opening rounds than Arsenal.
So yes, they have had a couple more games, but of course they have always got the opporunity to play some players who don’t normally get games – especially against the weaker sides in the Conference League.
Arsenal have had 12 different players this season who have started 12 games or more, and another 12 players who have started between one and nine games this season – and here I am including league, league cup and Champions League games.
Palace have had 12 players this season who have started 12 games or more and another 13 players who have started between one and seven games this season.
Thus, the difference between the two clubs in terms of players and games is incredibly small – and yet the story in the Guardian about the number of games Palace have played ignores the fact that it is virtually the same number of games as Arsenal. And the fact that Palace knew exactly what they were getting into the moment they accepted qualification for the European Conference League.
And yet the headline “Tuesday’s quarter-final will be the Eagles’ 29th game of the season and Gabriel Jesus is set to line up against them” suggests that somehow Arsenal have some extra advantage over Palace in having played many games fewer, which is simply not true.
Now I do get emails (such as the one published in the last couple of days) asking why I go on and on about the media, and this is a perfect example of why. Because articles like this deliberately set out to make it appear that Arsenal have an easy ride and poor Crystal Palace are having a tough time of it through no fault of their own.
This effect is invariably achieved by only giving one side of the story (the number of games Palace has played) and not mentioning that the other side of the story is similar. It is like sayng Arsenal have had 22 yellow cards this season – and seuggesting that is a shockingly high total of yellows before Christmas but not quoting any other clubs’ totals.
But in fact Arsenal, with 22 cards this season, are bottom of the yellow card table. What actually is interesting is that Tottenham are top of the yellow card table with 44 yellows and two reds (Arsenal have no reds this season). So here’s a headline for Christmas: Tottenham has been awarded twice the number of yellow cards as Arsenal this season so far. Palace, in case you are interested, have 30 cards this season – and to be clear, these numbers are for cards waved in Premier League games this campaign.
Now, of course, I am aware that one or two people do regularly comment upon the fact that I make much of what the media says – and this is a perfect example of why. Because much of the time, the media is not factually incorrect – it is factually incomplete. And I find that frustrating.
I think it is an interesting additional fact to note that one club has received double the number of yellow cards that Arsenal has had, especially when the media at large fail to mention it at all, and yet I recall that in the past, when they have felt that Arsenal have had lots of yellow cards, that has indeed been mentioned.
Anyway, what this means is that we might expect Palace to get more cards than Arsenal tonight, and given the way the game has been written up so far, that might be expressed in the media as “surprising” – although numbers won’t be quoted. (Unless of course the media has read this little piece, which might encourage them to lay off the subject – but I don’t kid myself that my statistics, any more than my daily ramblings, actually get people to change their minds.
But just in case you like a few stats, here is an extract from the card table after 17 games extracted from ESPN. The points total in the final column is calculated as one point for a yellow and three for a red.
| Team | Yellow | Red | PTS | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Tottenham Hotspur | 44 | 2 | 50 |
| 2 | AFC Bournemouth | 42 | 1 | 45 |
| 3 | Brighton & Hove Albion | 41 | 0 | 41 |
| 4 | Wolverhampton Wanderers | 37 | 2 | 43 |
| 5 | Everton | 35 | 1 | 38 |
| 6 | Sunderland | 35 | 2 | 41 |
| 7 | Chelsea | 35 | 4 | 47 |
| 8 | Brentford | 34 | 0 | 34 |
| 9 | Liverpool | 33 | 0 | 33 |
| 10 | Crystal Palace | 30 | 0 | 30 |
| 11 | Manchester City | 28 | 0 | 28 |
| 11 | Fulham | 28 | 0 | 28 |
| 13 | Leeds United | 27 | 0 | 27 |
| 14 | Nottingham Forest | 26 | 0 | 26 |
| 15 | West Ham United | 26 | 2 | 32 |
| 16 | Aston Villa | 25 | 1 | 28 |
| 17 | Burnley | 24 | 2 | 30 |
| 18 | Manchester United | 24 | 1 | 27 |
| 19 | Newcastle United | 22 | 2 | 28 |
| 20 | Arsenal | 22 | 0 | 22 |
