- Newcastle v Arsenal: the injuries, Newcastle burn out, Arsenal’s 18 out of 22.
- Stuart Attwell as referee: his home/away records for tackles, fouls and cards
- Newcastle v Arsenal. Arsenal’s astonishing tactical progress clear for all to see
By Bulldog Drummond
It appears we are into the “yer havin a larf” season as we have the Mirror still rambling on about having access to a supercomputer (which is totally impossible, given the costs of such things, and the demands on their use for everything from flood and storm warnings – highly relevant in England at the moment – to the defense of the realm. But no, the crazies running the Mirror still think their readership are so silly that they will actually believe that a supercomputer is going to be used in terms of predicting a result. It just shows the contempt with which their readers are held.
Indeed what is doubly noticeable is that the day after an Arsenal game the Mirror’s scribblers refuse to go back, look at their supercomputerised predictions and then try and explain why they got it all so wrong. I mean what is the point of a “super” computer if it gets it wrong much of the time?
Although to be fair, with their prediction that “Fulham have ZERO chance of winning the title come the end of the season” they are probably right. But do we need a computer that costs tens of thousands of pounds an hour to run, to tell us that?
Here’s another one. Liverpool are going to beat Luton – apparently, there is a 66.66% chance of that. As for Newcastle, the supercomputer “gives the hosts a 40.4 per cent chance of coming out on top, compared to Arsenal at 30.3 and the draw at 29.3.” So it is not only not a supercomputer, but also simply dealing in probabilities.
Moving on we have “Cannon Stats #21 – Injury Prone Arsenal” another email that popped in through our emailbox. Which is a bit funny because earlier we published an article Newcastle v Arsenal: the injuries which gave a complete run down of injuries. The top of that table read at the top…
- Manchester City: 2 players injured
- Everton: 3 players injured
- West Ham United: 3 players injured
- Arsenal: 4 players injured
and at the bottom
- Chelsea: 8 players injured
- Manchester United: 8 players injured
- Sheffield United: 9 players injured
- Newcastle United: 10 players injured
Still this does seem to be a day of silly headlines, so maybe “injury prone Arsenal” is just meant to be irony. As I suppose is the headline, Desailly explains why Konate is better than “average” Saliba
But then having ravaged Arsenal the Mirror really flies its colours with “Spurs sit atop the Premier League table after a brilliant start under new boss Ange Postecoglou.”
So let us ponder the table…
We can’t argue with the fact that Tottenham are two points ahead although with an inferior goal difference. But we could take up the issue of the quality of opposition the two clubs have had and the number of yellow cards the two clubs have had.
If we take the total number of points accrued by the league clubs Tottenham have played in their ten league games that is 113. To be clear that is the number of points the opposition clubs have got all added together this season as a way of measuring the strength of the opposition.
If we do the same for Arsenal that is 128. That shows that Arsenal have played stronger teams than Tottenham across the first ten league games making life that much easier for Tottenham.
We might also consider the number of yellow cards accumulated by the two clubs thus far – not because that made life harder in the past but because it will make it harder in the future. We have touched on this before but it is again one of the things that little Untold Arsenal sitting with a calculator can work out but which the mighty Daily Mirror with access to a supercomputer seemingly can’t.
Arsenal are top of the league for good behaviour with just 15 yellows and 1 red this season equal with Everton. Manchester City have 18 yellows and 2 reds – exactly the same as Liverpool.
Now heading down the league what we find is that Chelsea and Tottenham sit in 18th and 19th positions with 30 yellows and one red each. That is double (ie, for the sake of the Daily Mirror, 100% more than) Arsenal. Only Wolverhampton are worse.
I wonder if the “supercomputer” was actually told that?
Up next, the team prediction.
Regarding Arsenal compared to Spurs.
Under all parameters we have had a slightly tougher set of fixtures than Spurs but we have both played a few of the same teams, coincidently with identical home/away fixtures.
As we had played a few of the same teams the other day I did the stats and we out performed them in nearly every parameter. Goal difference. Attacks. Dangerous attacks. We scored a lot more but let in 1 more.
Spurs won all the games we won 5 drew 1. The equaliser from Fulham being the spanner in the works.
Just watched a referee exhibiting a fine example of pitch tilting in the Fulham Man Utd game.
I was only half watching but thought, United are getting away with murder here, whilst Fulham can hardly breath on a United player, so I checked the stats, as you do.
Man United 15 fouls for 2 yellows.
Fulham 9 fouls for 6 yellows.
Honestly, it was laughable, not for Fulham obviously. Joke.