Arsenal v Newcastle: the referee and the result as predicted by past matches

 

 

• • Arsenal v Newcastle: the referee and the result as predicted by past matches
  • Arsenal v Newcastle: a chance for a resounding victory

By Tony Attwood

The referee for the game will be Darren England.  In the table below, we compare his rate of giving fouls, penalties and cards with those of other referees, each of whom has been in charge of at least 11 Premier League games this season.

 

Referee	GamES	Fouls pg	Pen pg	Yel pg	Red pg
Robert Jones	22	24.82	0.27	4.23	0.18
Michael Oliver	26	23.15	0.12	4.35	0.19
Tim Robinson	15	23.13	0.20	4.40	0.13
Darren England	20	23.00	0.20	4.10	0.20
Thomas Bramall	11	20.45	0.36	3.27	0.36
Darren Bond	14	22.29	0.36	3.93	0.07
Difference		21%	300%	34%	414%

 

This season the difference between the number of fouls called per game by each referee who gets tot oversee games on a regular basis, is moderate.  So as we can see, the referee who is working this weekend and is a regular Premier League referee who gives out the most fouls calls 21% more fouls than the referee among our selection who sees the least.

And the referee who hands out the most yellow cards gives out 34% mroe yellow cards than the regular referee who is working this weekend, who gives out the lowest number of yellow cards.

These numbers are larger than I suspect anyone who wants to see regularity and consistency in refereeing would wish to see, since it is crazy that, for example, one referee will hand out 34% more cards on average across the season than another, while both are getting regular games in charge.

But this is nothing when compared with penalties, where the referee who really does keep seeing fouls in the box all the time, sees three times as many penalties as the referee from our selection who sees the least.   And so the question might reasonably be asked…

HOW CAN ONE REFEREE ON AVERAGE GET TO AWARD THREE TIMES AS MANY PENALTIES AS ANOTHER, GAME BY GAME?

But even this is as nothing when compared to red cards, where the most card-happy ref waves four times as many as the most moderate referee!   Yet all these referees are regularly overseeing games in the Premier League and seem to be free to keep on doing their own thing in their own way without anyone doing anything to rein them in, or in a few cases, make these referees slightly more observant.

The fact is that any club that sees that it is Bramall who is going to be the referee for their next game must, if it is being serious in its match preparation, tell its defenders to be extra cautious on fouls in or on the edge of the penalty area.  Indeed, tackling within the area with Brammall in charge means a penalty and a card.

But this is most certainly not how it should be.   Game plans should be altered depending on the oppositioni and the way they like to play, but not according to the referee and the way he sees offences.

Now, Darren England, who is in charge of Arsenal’s forthcoming match, is interesting in that his figures fall in the mid-range of the other most-used referee on all the metrics we look at.  He is not top in any particular category, although he is pretty close to the top when it comes to waving red cards, so there should be a warning there.  If you are on a yellow, take it easy, or better still, if possible, allow yourself to be substituted by the manager (who surely must be aware of these things and keeping count).

But overall, the variation between referees remains lunatic, with two referees giving three times as many penalties as one of their equally regularly used colleagues,  is bonkers.   And that is before we notice that the referee most prone to waving around red cards is giving out four times as many reds as the least prone referee in this regard.

We have already looked at the last six games for Newcastle and Arsenal and seen Arsenal considerably ahead on this metric, but there is sometimes the argument that says that six is too few a number to draw any conclusions from, so here is the comparison over the last ten games…

 

So yes once again in the metrics, Arsenal are doing the better of the two teams, and here we really can see a significant difference, even at a time when the media has been revelling in the fact that Arsenal are in terminal decline.  There’s an 18 goal difference between the two clubs over ten games which suggests a 2-0 win to Arsenal, but I think I would still expect 3-0 as Newcastle get a bit fed up with it all near the end.