By Bulldog Drummond
- Leicester City v Arsenal: Arsenal play a club that is actually worse than Tottenham
- Leicester v Arsenal. The worst vs the best League team in the last 10 games
Sam Barrott is the referee for the match against Leicester this weekend. And in looking at his form, as usual in our statistics, we only look at referees who have undertaken 10 or more games in the League this season.
Thus in the following table, we look at the referees who have overseen 12 or more games in the PL this season, comparing the number of fouls they have called out per game and the number of yellow cards they have waved around per game.
And looking at these numbers you don’t have to be a mathematician to wonder why Jones sees on average 38% more fouls per game than Bankes, and Brooks hands out 60% more yellow cards than Taylor per game. But that is how it is. The ways of the PGMO are wondrous to behold..
| Referee | Games | Fouls pg | Yel pg |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1.Anthony Taylor | 21 | 21.52 | 3.38 |
| 5.Peter Bankes | 15 | 18.93 | 3.93 |
| 6.Samuel Barrott | 15 | 20.40 | 4.40 |
| 8.Robert Jones | 14 | 26.21 | 4.79 |
| 11.John Brooks | 12 | 22.92 | 5.42 |
| Top/bottom variation | 38% | 60% |
The referee for Leicester City v Arsenal is Samuel Barrott as we have noticed and he is for once a referee of an Arsenal game who is mid-table in in foul calling and card waving. It makes a change, especially as we have a 60% variance between referees love how many cards they wave per game.
Here we look at the various excesses of the referees in terms of results and compare them with Samuel Barrott.
| Referee | Games | HomeWin% | AwayWin% | Draw% |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Darren Bond | 10 | 80.0% | 0.0% | 20.0% |
| Anthony Taylor | 21 | 19.0% | 57.1% | 23.8% |
| Chris Kavanagh | 16 | 6.3% | 25.0% | 68.8% |
| Samuel Barrott | 15 | 40.0% | 53.3% | 6.7% |
What we can see here is the insane ranges for referee results this season. In terms of home wins, Bond has seen 80% of his games as home wins, while Kavangah has only seen 19% of his games as home wins.
For away wins Bond hasn’t seen a single away win this season while Taylor and Barrott have over half of their games end as away wins.
As for draws, if you are looking for those just follow Kavangagh for whom over two thirds of his matches are draws. If you want to avoid a draw, Barrott is your man.
All things put together, Barrott is high up on the away win list having over a half of his games end as away wins while Bond has none.
So we can say that Barrott, the referee for the Leicester versus Arsenal game, is more inclined toward an away win than many others, and for once that will suit Arsenal.
Add to this the fact that Leicester have only won one game in their last nine (and that by beating Tottenham), so we should have a good chance. In fact Leicester have only won two out of 12 games all season.
It is also interesting to note that although Leicester City won the Championship last season they actually managed to get five home defeats in that campaign – remarkably high for the top club in the league.
Now I have also had a couple of emails of late asking why I don’t quote more data on possession, as this is often mentioned in reports. And the reason quite simply is that I am not sure it really tells us anything. But I thought I would have a look, and while I was at it look at the number of players used since there has been so much talk about Arsenal having a very small squad. Data here from Premier League stats
This table below is in the order of possession with Manchester City at the top Arsenal in fifth and Leicester City in 16th. In terms of players used Nottingham Forest has the smallest number, followed by Arsenal, Liverpool and Newcastle. At the top end of players used are Southampton, followed by Ipswich, Brighton and then Tottenham. So using a big squad does not equate with winning lots of games. Not at all!!!
Also while there has been a lot of criticism about Arsenal having too small a squad, it turns out Arsenal have used the same number of players as Liverpool.
In terms of possession being a way to win games, well, not really, since Tottenham have the fourth-highest level. But it is true that as the possession level sinks so does the chance of a club being high up the league with Nottingham Forest being the real exception to the rule.
Figures below from FB Ref.
| Players used | % Possession | |
| Manchester City | 26 | 60.8 |
| Chelsea | 27 | 58.1 |
| Liverpool | 24 | 58.0 |
| Tottenham Hots | 29 | 57.3 |
| ARSENAL | 24 | 54.8 |
| Manchester Utd | 25 | 54.0 |
| Brighton & HA | 30 | 53.5 |
| Fulham | 25 | 52.8 |
| Southampton | 33 | 51.6 |
| Newcastle Utd | 24 | 51.0 |
| Aston Villa | 25 | 50.3 |
| Brentford | 27 | 47.9 |
| West Ham United | 26 | 46.5 |
| Wolverhampton Wanderers | 26 | 46.5 |
| AFC Bournemouth | 28 | 46.2 |
| Leicester City | 28 | 46.0 |
| Crystal Palace | 26 | 43.5 |
| Ipswich Town | 31 | 40.8 |
| Everton | 25 | 40.3 |
| Nott’ham Forest | 23 | 40.0 |
More tomorrow
