Untold Ref Review: Manchester United 2 – 0 Queens Park Rangers

This article is part of a series stretching over several seasons in which a team of referees analyse the work of refs in Premier League matches.

Our figures show that when we analyse the errors made by refs there are consistent trends which do not “even out” through the season, as some commentators would have it.    All the earlier ref reviews plus analyses of the errors made by refs, and articles relating to our campaign to have the body which organises referees activities reformed, plus an analysis of the background to this campaign, can be found on:

• Untold Ref Reviews …
• Untold Corruption …

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Today’s referee is Lee Mason –

MATCH REVIEW DETAILS – Lee Mason (2012-04-08)
Period 1
Min	Type	Foul from	On	C/NC	Comment	Weight
3	OTHER	Hill	Welbeck	C	Late, studs to boot, might have been booked	1
6	OTHER	Diakite	Young	C	Trip	1
10	OTHER	Rooney	Diakite	C	Scythed down from behind	1
10	YELLOW	Rooney		NC	A hard Yellow, but not given	2
14	OFFSIDE	Young		NC	A yard offside,linesman should have seen this	1
14	PENALTY	Derry	Young	NC	Young felt Derry’s hand on back and dived to the ground	3
14	RED	Derry		NC	It was offside, not a penalty, and thus shouldn’t have been sent off	3
14	YELLOW	Young		NC	Should have been booked for simulation	2
15	GOAL	Rooney		NC	Scored from wrongly awarded penalty	3
16	OTHER	Mackie	Evra	C	Push	1
18	OTHER	Hill	Welbeck	C	Obstruction	1
20	OTHER	Taiwo	Rafael	NC	Shove not given	1
21	OTHER	Rafael	Diakite	C	Shove	1
27	OTHER	Rafael	Taarabt	C	Trip	1
32	OFFSIDE	Welbeck		C		1
35	OTHER	Onuoha	Young	C	Trip, advantage played	1
35	PENALTY			C	Valencia tried to cut inside Taiwo and fell, good non call	3
35	OTHER	Taiwo	Valencia	C	Trip	1
36	OTHER	Bothroyd	Carrick	C	Little foul	1
38	OTHER	Bothroyd		C	Handball	1
43	OTHER	Buzsaky	Rooney	C	Slight trip	1
44	OTHER	Bothroyd	Evans	C	Hand to face disputing header	1
Period 2
Min	Type	Foul from	On	C/NC	Comment	Weight
47	OFFSIDE	Welbeck		C	Just offside	1
49	OTHER	Onuoha	Young	C	Trip	1
49	OFFSIDE	Welbeck		C	Correctly called onside	1
53	OTHER	Young	Taarabt	C	Trip	1
54	OTHER			NC	Ball last off Evra, should have been corner to QPR	1
59	OFFSIDE	Rafael		C	Beat trap, correctly called onside	1
61	OFFSIDE	Valencia		C	Assumed correct	1
68	GOAL	Scholes		C	Goal okay	3
70	OTHER	Scholes	Mackie	C	Trip	1
72	OTHER	Smith	Giggs	C	Trip	1
73	OTHER	Rafael	Buzsaky	C	Rafael slipped and fell into Buzsaky	1
73	YELLOW	Rafael		NC	Wrongly booked for simulation	2
75	OTHER	Cleverey	Smith	C	Trip	1
76	OTHER	Cleverey	Onuoha	C	Ran into him	1
80	OTHER	Valencia	Smith	C	Atempted trip	1
85	OTHER	Evra	Campbell	C	Trip	1
91	OTHER	Rooney	Campbell	C	Trip	1

Clint Hill made the first foul of the match catching Danny Welbeck a bit late.  And while you could say that the ref might have pulled out a yellow card for this tackle, what Rooney did in the 10th minute was not really debatable.

The Manchester forward lost possession and in an attempt to get the ball back, he somewhat scissor tripped Samba Diakite from behind.  It wasn’t a particularly violent tackle by Rooney but it was one that definitely deserved a booking, but Lee Mason decided to only whistle for the foul.  However the real controversy of this match happened in the 14th minute.

Ashley Young had slipped behind QPR’s line of defense and then the ball was played to him.  He was about a yard offside and it wasn’t a particularly difficult call for the linesman to make.  Nonetheless the linesman’s flag stayed down.

As Young ran onto the ball, he felt Shaun Derry’s hand on him, and even though it was the slightest of touches, Young decided to throw his legs out and fall to ground.  Young had simulated and deserved a booking, but the ref, perhaps thinking that Derry had tripped him not only gave Manchestr the spot kick, but he sent off Derry for denying an obvious goal scoring opportunity.  Now if the linesman had done his job properly none of this would have happened, but as it was, it did happen and QPR were effectively killed off by the 15th minute when Rooney put United up 1 – 0 and Rangers were reduced to ten men.

The match was pretty uneventful from that point onwards.  QPR barely committed any more fouls.  Paul Scholes added a second goal in the 68th minute which killed off the match, if it hadn’t been already.

Lee Mason would have had an excellent match if it hadn’t been for the erroneous offside/penalty/sending off call in the first half.  He did get the vast majority of the other calls right on the day, with one more exception that he booked Rafael for simulation in the 73rd minute well outside the penalty area when in fact the Brazilian defender had merely slipped.  Perhaps Lee Mason was feeling guilty for what had happened in the first half, and decided to book a United player as a concession.  But it didn’t gloss over the massive injustice that QPR suffered at the expense of Manchester United.

 

COMPETENCY SUMMARY – Lee Mason (2012-04-08)
Period 1	Called	Total	Correct %
GOAL	0	1	0.00
OFFSIDE	1	2	50.00
OTHER	13	14	92.86
PENALTY	1	2	50.00
RED	0	1	0.00
YELLOW	0	2	0.00
TOTAL	15	22	68.18
WEIGHTED	17	32	53.13
Period 2	Called	Total	Correct %
GOAL	1	1	100.00
OFFSIDE	4	4	100.00
OTHER	10	11	90.91
YELLOW	0	1	0.00
TOTAL	15	17	88.24
WEIGHTED	17	20	85.00
Totals	Called	Total	Correct %
GOAL	1	2	50.00
OFFSIDE	5	6	83.33
OTHER	23	25	92.00
PENALTY	1	2	50.00
RED	0	1	0.00
YELLOW	0	3	0.00
TOTAL	30	39	76.92
WEIGHTED	34	52	65.38

A very poor score in the first half.  Once the work was done he could become a ref and rescue his score in the second half.

BIAS SUMMARY – Lee Mason (2012-04-08)
Period 1	Manchester United	%	Queens Park Rangers	%	Total
Correct For	9	60.00	6	40.00	15
Correct For Weighted	9	52.94	8	47.06	17
Incorrect Against	1	14.29	6	85.71	7
Incorrect Against Weighted	1	6.67	14	93.33	15
Fouls Commited	5	35.71	9	64.29	14
Fouls Penalised	5	100.00	8	88.89	13
Period 2	Manchester United	%	Queens Park Rangers	%	Total
Correct For	5	33.33	10	66.67	15
Correct For Weighted	7	41.18	10	58.82	17
Incorrect Against	1	50.00	1	50.00	2
Incorrect Against Weighted	2	66.67	1	33.33	3
Fouls Commited	8	80.00	2	20.00	10
Fouls Penalised	8	100.00	2	100.00	10
Totals	Manchester United	%	Queens Park Rangers	%	Total
Correct For	14	46.67	16	53.33	30
Correct For Weighted	16	47.06	18	52.94	34
Incorrect Against	2	22.22	7	77.78	9
Incorrect Against Weighted	3	16.67	15	83.33	18
Fouls Commited	13	54.17	11	45.83	24
Fouls Penalised	13	100.00	10	90.91	23

Look at that bias score in the incorrect decisions. Old Trafford lives up to its reputation. So did the ref.

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