“Wow, this football is not for me.” That was allegedly said by Robert Pires, sat on the bench at the Stadium of Light, waiting to make his debut for Arsenal in August 2000. And yes, sometimes football at Sunderland is not for everyone, as Mikel Arteta’s side sort of found out in this fixture last season, conceding late on to draw 2-2. But Arsenal have advanced since then, Sunderland maybe less so.”
That came from The Athletic but I pause for a moment in terms of its veracity because Robert’s command of English, even well into his career, was not that good, and the notion of him being able to conjure up a colloquial phrase like “not for me” seems unlikely. But I get the point.
Anyway, what about the referee?
Now to divert for a moment, one of the things that makes me feel Untold is doing its job properly comes when soemthing that we have been discussing for years, but which rarely turns up on blogs or in newspapers, suddenly does become a topic of information.
So they ask, “What is Arsenal’s record with John Brooks?” and conclude that “Arsenal have generally enjoyed a strong record when Brooks has been in charge in that Arsenal have four wins, one draw and one defeat under him. They also note “His only defeat while refereeing Arsenal came in the 2024/25 Carabao Cup semi-final first leg against Newcastle.”
Now that is good stuff, although it does continue the focus that we have seen elsewhere in terms of referees being kinder to some clubs than others, and I am not sure that is alwasy the defning factor. Which is why I have instead chosen to look at the issue of the referees record in general in terms of his reponse to situations irrespective of the team playing.
This is of course quite a deviance from the commonplace referee approach which says “This ref is anti-Arsenal” or whatever. Rather it suggests that referees tend towards certain behaviour in matches which can swamp what the teams do in the match.
As for the team the Standard suggest
Raya;
White, Konsa, Gabriel, Calafiori;
Rice, Guimaraes;
Saka, Odegaard, Tzolis;
Havertz.
