By Bulldog Drummond
CNN have said, “Mikel Arteta was left lamenting a controversial penalty decision on Saturday, the likes of which he said he has “never seen,” and which consigned his team to a 1-1 draw at Brighton.” He called the decision, “very disappointing,” and added, “When you look at the incident, the distance, the player, João (Pedro) touching the ball, Saliba touching the ball, you can see contact there.”
Gary Lineker said on BBC’s “Match of the Day” that, “never ever have we seen a penalty given for head clashes.”
When asked if he expected the penalty to be overturned, Arteta said: “I checked and after three seconds they said they already checked it. It seems quick.”
What is worrying of course is that having got away with that this will set a precedent. Arsenal are of course known as a club that is not afraid to hold authorities to account and that is something that anyone with something to hide will always dislike, And if ever there is an agency with something to hide it must be PGMO. If they did not have something to hide then surely they would behave as German referees do and come on TV after a game and discuss the match, as well as have a website on which such facts can be disclosed and discussions can take place.
The referee and others involved tonight are….
- Ref: JOHN BROOKS
- Linespeople: Ian Hussin and Wade Smith
- Fourth Official: Tony Harrington
- VAR: Michael Salisbury
- AVAR: Adam Nunn.
Here we compare what Brooks does with the activities of a few other referees who have overseen 15 or more Premier League games this season. So these are not newcomers to the League but referees who have been around the block a few times.
In order to get an overview of the leading referees we can look back to last season, with the full set of results that gives us, and see that in terms of fouls, David Coote saw 23% more fouls per match than John Brooks. Are we really expected to believe that game after game with Coote there are 25% more fouls, or is it that referees just go their own ways?
David Coote hands out 45% more yellow cards per game than Samuel Barrot. Are we really expected to believe that Mr Taylor tends to be given the rough and rowdy games while Mr Barrott gets the quiet ones? Or is it just possible that there is absolutely no common ground between the referees, and whether a club is likely to get a lot of yellow cards is dependent on the referee?
John Brooks is near the top of the red card table – something of interest to Arsenal when you remember the fuss the media made about Arsenal’s three red cards early on. Brooks is not the top ref for sendings off, but he sends of 157% more players than for example Samuel Barrot when we measure the figures game by game. Which is utterly ludicrous. Red cards should be because of fouls – not because you happened to get Coote or Brooks refereeing as opposed to Barrott!
What I have also done is added to last season’s John Brooks’ in the last row, again measuring per game for comparison.
| Referee | Games | Fouls pg | Yel pg | Red pg |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Anthony Taylor | 27 | 21.26 | 4.81 | 0.15 |
| Paul Tierney | 25 | 21.80 | 3.52 | 0.12 |
| John Brooks | 22 | 21.86 | 4.00 | 0.18 |
| David Coote | 16 | 24.69 | 5.19 | 0.19 |
| Samuel Barrott | 15 | 20.13 | 3.13 | 0.07 |
| John Brooks 2024/25 |
9 |
24.33 |
5.78 |
0.00 |
The very first, most basic thing, should be that referees are consistent with themselves and with each other, but PGMO seems utterly to glory in the fact that this is not the case, continuing to employ referees whose on-pitch behaviour is quite different one from another – and in the case of tonight’s referee, from himself last season!
Brooks this season is seeing 13% more fouls per game than last season and giving a whacking great 45% more yellow cards than last season! Are we really to believe that Brooks is seeing much tougher games this season, or is he just getting the hang of where his cards are?
What players and supporters want more than anything else is consistency – consistency between referees and consistency by referees from one match to the next.
But of course, the media do not want this – they loved it when Arsenal got three red cards in the opening few games. The fact that Arsenal as of today has only one yellow card more than Tottenham and Manchester City, and the same number of cards as Liverpool does not fit the agenda and certainly is not something ever reported by the media.
And why this is not reported can be seen when we look at yellow cards from fouls rather than anything else. Because Arsenal are 19th out of 20th in the yellow card list for fouls, running at around half the rate of the most fouling team, Southampton, and below Liverpool, ManU, Tottenham, ManC, Newcastle… None of this is now ever mentioned. In fact only Brentford have fewer yellows for fouls than Arsenal. But don’t ever tell the journalists.
Actually, I am sure the journalists know. It must just have slipped their minds. Or maybe they ran over their word allowance.
