- Arsenal glide through despite the warnings and demands
- An interview on Radio 5 about “North London Forever”
By Tony Attwood
The Telegraph called it “The most controversial red card of the season,” and the Guardian noted that “it seems inevitable Arsenal will dispute PGMOL’s definition of ‘serious foul play’ in the coming days, after the referee Michael Oliver’s remarkable call to punish Myles Lewis-Skelly for a cynical trip with a red card,”
The Arsenal player with the most yellow cards lies 13th in the yellow card table (it is Timber with six). That’s an easy stat to find, but what you are far less likely to see in a meander around the media, is the fact that Arsenal are 13th in the yellow card table with 47 cards in total. Nor will you be told that Chelsea have around 30% more yellow cards than Arsenal this season. These things, the media seem to agree, are best not mentioned.
Nor will you see a report (except for here) that if we just take yellow cards from fouls Arsenal have received 28 – only Brentford has received fewer. The team with the most yellow cards has almost double the number of yellow cards that Arsenal have.
But no, none of that will be mentioned. What you might find however is that somehow Arsenal have been given four red cards – and that point will probably turn up – nor the fact that Arsenal have not had a red card for a while was quite probably either in the referee’s subconscious, (or indeed was overtly mentioned in the League’s pre-match briefing to the referee). So yes four red cards for Arsenal – and you might care, if you have the time, to go and look at the outrageous offences that have led to these. (Here’s a hint – the last one was for kicking the ball two yards back to the place where a foul took place).
And why now? Well, it is of course a coincidence, that Arsenal have been top of the red card league on their own for much of this season, and it is only as Arsenal’s red card tall of three had been equalled by West Ham and Southampton, that Arsenal get a fourth, which keeps them out on its own at the top. The media can thus continue the “dirty Arsenal” theme.
But more than anything what will also annoy some is that despite the particular attention of referees in this way, Arsenal are still second, and are three points above Forest in third with a goal difference that is 14 better than that of Forest.
And you might also miss the fact (largely because it is so rarely if ever publicised) that Arsenal have the best defence in the league. – despite having half that defence missing for a fair number of games). Although of course, you will have heard that just as last season and the season before Arsenal are utterly desperate to sign a new striker. But then again we might note that despite Tottenham having scored more goals than Arsenal this season, Tottenham currently reside in 15th position. That is to say just three places above relegation.
Before the season started, the Guardian said of Tottenham that “What feels clear is that Spurs’ primary objective for the new season is securing a top-four finish for the first time in three years,” And oh how wrong can one be? Their objective is clearly simply to avoid relegation.
But back with Arsenal, at half time the referee called on three security guards to help him off the pitch. And whose fault was that?
And yet, even though for much of the game Arsenal were a man short, they still managed to get close to having half the possession (actually it was 51% to Wolverhampton, 49% to Arsenal.)
However, if you want a really interesting statistic, try fouls. 20 by Wolverhampton nine by Arsenal. That really does give a clue to what was going on in this game. And yet it was Arsenal that got the red card.
But one thing is absolutely certain, Arsenal will feel good about this win. Overcoming a referee who seemed to be high on his own importance, and with ten men, is not mean feat. And I think Arsenal players who are not already convinced will now realise for sure that a match for Arsenal means 11 v 12, until of course the ref gets a-waving and then it is 10 v 12.
And yet they can still win.
Tony
“What you might find however is that somehow Arsenal have been given four red cards – and that point will probably turn up ”
It already has. In fact it happened immediately on ‘Soccer Saturday’
As I pointed out at the time, the first thing the anchor said was:
“That’s 4 red cards for Arsenal this season”
No context. No mention of just how dubious they have been.
I also said yesterday that there was ‘No suggestion that todays was yet another poor decision against Arsenal’, which was actually wrong because the studio reporter said it was wrong, as did Mike Dean, who’s immediate reaction was:
“‘What he’s done he hasn’t kicked him, he’s gone to trip him and caught the bottom of his boot. I don’t think it’s a straight red card in my opinion, I don’t think it is.”
But he took him less than 30seconds to recant and fall back in line with:
“I’ve got a still image here and when you see the still image you might understand what the referee’s done,’ Dean said. ‘It looks like he’s gone to kick him but he’s actually put his studs right down the inside of Doherty’s leg, so that’s why he’s sent him off for serious foul play.”
Read that and weep.
So Dean says: “…..he’s actually put his studs right down the inside of Doherty’s leg”. NO HE HASN’T. And you can see he hasn’t from all the replays. Photo’s can be, and often are misleading, which is why VAR doesn’t look back at photo’s, they look at replays from every angle.
What Dean is saying is that ONE STILL PHOTOGRAPH is more representative of what happened than either seeing it in real time or, in VAR’s case, seeing the replay many times from many angles.
That is how far, or in fact how low some of these people will go to defend the indefensible, especially when it’s Arsenal.
How can SKY employ someone as an analyst that actually thinks like that??
Personally I will be amazed if the Red Card is overturned. This requires the Premier League to tell their star man he got it wrong. And worse, tell all their puppets in Stockley Park that despite several replays from different angels they still saw nothing wrong with Olivers decision.
Despite a surprisingly united media that this was in fact a very poor decision, I just cant see it being overturned. They WILL find a way to justify it and defend their officials.
I don’t think that this was a referee error; so much as a consciously anti-Arsenal wrong decision. I also suspect that there is prior collusion between the referee and the VAR team, so that they are prepared to automatically endorse this kind of decision when it happens.
Even supporters of other clubs have started to recognise the anti-Arsenal -(therefore pro-MC / Lverpool) bias in Oliver’s decisions.
I don’t expect an appeal to succeed, but I believe that Arsenal should appeal the red card, as a start in confronting the corruption within the PGMOL and the complicit other bodies.
In a previous post, I estimated that we have had 10 points deliberately taken by referees. Each new event reinforces this belief.
I look forward to the day when Oliver (and the rest) are exposed for what they are. In the meantime, any guesses about who will be the match officials for our next league fixture?
We also had at least (from highlights) 2 good penalty shouts totally ignored.
PGMOL have issued a statement in full support of both Oliver and England and also say they are appalled by the media condemnation of them.
What a surprise, I didn’t expect anything different if I am honest.
There is also an article on GIVEMESPORT titled ‘Michael Oliver’s Record vs Arsenal Compared to Premier League Teams’ which basically confirms that Oliver appears to have a definite bias against Arsenal. It has a comparison chart showing red cards and other parameters, yellow cards, penalties etc. We do not fare well, which is no surprise.
Laughable. Beyond embarrassing.
Do they give a shit? Do they f***
A quick look around fan comments and social media shows overwhelming condemnation of Oliver and VAR. Even in the usual partisan world of fandom there is a consensus that it was a terrible decision.
One summed it up very well when he said:
“Red yellow purple, who knows what it was. All I know is I have never seen a red card for such a foul. It is always a yellow. Why is this particular one any different? Consistency that’s all we ask and we cant even get that within one match, with one referee. Joke”
I also googled ‘The World is laughing at our referees’. You wont be surprised at just how many articles come up.
Webb should hang his head in shame.
Nitram,
I don’t believe that Webb and Co are principled enough to feel any shame.
This is simply the latest example of a deep-seated PGMOL culture which can be traced back through Oliver, Taylor, Dean, Atkinson, Dowd, Webb and Riley.
The introduction of VAR has given a whole new dimension to their cheating activity
John L
I know, you are right. PGMOL and principles should never be in the same sentence, and for that I hang MY head in shame. Sorry.
“The introduction of VAR has given a whole new dimension to their cheating activity”
I did an article about it many years ago when VAR was first muted. Some folk were saying it will help referees and in turn that will help us. I claimed it would do exactly the opposite, and I have been proved right.
In a nutshell I said that all it would do would give the officials a second chance to screw us, should the referee fail to do so, and so it has proved.
If it looks remotely like we ‘got away with one’, they will take a second look and make sure we didn’t.
If it looks like we were harshly treated VAR doesn’t say a word.
If it looks like an opponent ‘got away with one’ VAR just ignores it.
We had examples of each of those yesterday.
From reds that should have been yellows, yellows that should of been reds and good penalty shouts completely ignored.
I cant wait to hear how that Pigmob puppet Dermot Gallagher justifies everything that happened yesterday, and more over how Sky Sports will allow him to do so unchallenged.
Maybe I’ll be shocked?
I see our mates down the road have squandered a halftime lead against Leicester and are now losing 2-1.
Is ‘spursy’ now classified as an actual word?
Time for Big Sam down the Lane!
Mick Shelley.
As far as I know it is actually a dictionary term.
As hilarious as Spurs and their fawning pals in the media are, moving back to things closer to home. Just got sent this so I hope it’s accurate as I haven’t checked, but it ‘feels’ as if it will be:
Arsenal under Arteta
PREMIER LEAGUE
Played: 195 games
Red Cards: 19 (1 in every 10 games )
EUROPA/CHAMPIUONS LEAGUE
Played 41 games
Red Cards: 1 (1 in every 49 games)
Says it all.
Note: The media must know this. I mean they instantly know that we have the most red cards in the PL this season, so they are obviously all over these things?????
I wonder if that enormous discretion between refereeing will be pointed out by any of those guys?
Absolutely no chance.
This is my comment on the red card decision in the Wolves match:
THE LAST TIME AN 18 YEAR OLD WAS SHOWN A RED CARD IN THE PREMIER LEAGUE WAS IN 2010.
THE PLAYER – JACK WILSHIRE.
My source for this fact is ESPN website.
I was wondering what the stats were for fouls. Seeing how Wolves have more fouls yet the Wolves fans were chanting some ol’ Arsenal always cheating.