These figures only apply to this season and show Liverpool as making half as many fouls again as Arsenal.
There is a rough correlation between the number of yellow cards and the number of fouls called by the referee for each club, as can be seen in the fourth column (“fouls per card”) but it is far from exact, as noted above.
Coventry can commit 9.81 fouls before a card is waved, while Hull can commit only 3.8. Now in part this can be due to referees awarding yellow cards for repeated fouling, but even so the difference between the number of fouls Coventry get away with before a card, as opposed to and Hull City, is extraordinary. One might say beyond belief. If I were Hull’s manager I’d be lording a complaint.
Of course we have to recognise that yellow cards can be given for other activities beyond fouls such as protesting, delaying the taking of a free kick, and so forth, and there is no data to allow for this, but my observation of games is that these “other” reasons are modest when compared with cards for fouls, so the figures remain of interest.
Certainly it is interesting that Liverpool have committed 74% more fouls so far this season than Everton – one wonders if the clubs know that each other is behaving in such a different manner. But it remains the issue of the number of fouls per card that different clubs get that looks concerning.
It would appear that referees are giving out cards not just for fouls but for the cumulative effect of fouls, and I am not at all sure that this is how the rules of football are written. A tackle or an elbow etc is either a foul or not, but it seems that referes are indeed giving out cards for repeated foul play.
And so what of Arsenal?
Arsenal committed the third smallest number of fouls per game in the opening ten games of the season and got the third smallest number of yellow cards. Top of the league for fouls was Liverpool but top of the league for yellow cards was Hull – and my perception is that Hull might well consider taking this fact to the PGMO, and making the point public.
Coventry and Tottenham are committing the most fouls before a yellow card is waved, and it is interesting that Tottenham are getting away with twice as many fouls before a card is waved as some other clubs!
Are Tottenham’s fouls really so inoccuous that the referees don’t want to penalise? Or is it that the hospitality faciltieis in the referee’s chabnging areas are so nice in the new stadium that the referees don’t like to penalise their hosts? (Or could they just feel sorry for Tottenham, having spent all that money on a ground, but have come 17th for each of the last two seasons?)
Certainly Coventry can hardly complain about refereeing this season – they can commit 9.81 fols before they get a card waved, while the aforementioned Hull can only get away with 3.80. That doesn’t seem right.
I wonder why the referees have got it in for Hull this season? Are their referee changing rooms damp or crowded? Is the coffee cold? I think we should be told.
