RefWatch – Arsenal Vs Wigan Athletic (16/04/2012 – 20:00)



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By DogFace

  • Referee: Andre Marriner
  • Assistant 1: Gary Beswick
  • Assistant 2: Scott Ledger
  • 4th Official: Kevin Friend

Good morning stat-fans and welcome to RefWatch… I’ve just got back from holiday, it’s my lunch break and I have got half an hour to get this one out – it’s going to be brief so wish me luck and you’ll have to do most of the analysis yourself so wish me luck!

Asian Handicap (betting line) market:

Home Handicap Away
2.050 0 – 1 3/4 1.850

The Under/Over market:

Over Handicap Under
1.875 3 2.025

Let’s have a look at the Referee:

  • Full name: Andre Marriner
  • Date of birth: 01-Jan-1971 (Age 41)
  • Place of birth: Birmingham
  • Resides: West Midlands
  • EPL/ECH Referee Since: 2003/2004
  • EPL/ECH Games to date: 184

Andre Marriner
Andre Marriner – That performance alright for you Walter?

It’s Andre Marriner again… you remember him from all these lovely referee reviews that Walter and the team did:

Season Score Match
2011/2012 77.420% Bolton Wanderers 0 – 5 Manchester United
2011/2012 74.510% Blackburn Rovers 4 – 3 Arsenal
2011/2012 63.410% Liverpool 1 – 1 Manchester United
2011/2012 66.200% Chelsea 3 – 5 Arsenal
2011/2012 85.450% Arsenal 7 – 1 Blackburn Rovers
2011/2012 93.880% Swansea City 1 – 1 Chelsea
2011/2012 72.500% Tottenham Hotspur 5 – 0 Newcastle United
2011/2012 73.680% Norwich City 1 – 2 Manchester United
Average Score: 75.881%

Let’s check out his stats!

FPB = Fouls Per Booking (vertical axis)
BPM = Bookings Per Match(line width)
AHS = Asian Handicap Swing i.e. the deviation from the expected result(vertical axis)
PPG = Points Per Game(line width)
Therefore a high thin line for FPB/BPM would indicate a lot of fouls and very little bookings – and a low thin line for AHS/PPG would indicate an underperformance against the betting line and very few points taken.

Andre Marriner has had 12 games for Arsenal consisting of 8 wins, 2 draws and 2 losses.

Arsenal are currently in 3rd in Andre Marriner’s personal Points Per Game League (for teams with a minimum of 5 matches played), for matches in the EPL/ECH, with an average of 2.17 PPG.

In Andre Marriner’s personal Handicap Swing League (for teams with a minimum of 5 matches played), for matches in the EPL/ECH, Arsenal come 4th with an average positive swing of 0.42.

Arsenal are currently in 7th in Andre Marriner’s personal Booking’s Per Match League (for teams with a minimum of 5 matches played), for matches in the EPL/ECH, with an overall average of 1.25 BPM.

In Andre Marriner’s personal Fouls Per Booking League (for teams with a minimum of 5 matches played), for matches in the EPL/ECH, Arsenal come 8th with an overall average of 8.80 FPB.

The colour of the line represents the player type.
The position of the line against the vertical axis will indicate the average time of the booking and the thickness of the line indicates the average number of bookings of players in that position.
Therefore a high fat orange line would indicate that the referee often books the specified teams defence out of the challenge early, a low thin line or no line would indicate the opposite.  The number of minutes bottoms out at 100 to indicate no bookings.

Above is a seasonal breakdown on how, when and where Arsenal took all their bookings under Andre Marriner.

The colour of the line represents the player type.
The position of the line against the vertical axis will indicate the average time of the booking and the thickness of the line indicates the average number of bookings of players in that position.
Therefore a high fat orange line would indicate that the referee often books the specified teams defence out of the challenge early, a low thin line or no line would indicate the opposite.  The number of minutes bottoms out at 100 to indicate no bookings.

Above is a seasonal breakdown on how, when and where Arsenal’s opposition took all their bookings under Andre Marriner.

Let’s move on now and see how Wigan fare under the whistle of Andre Marriner:

FPB = Fouls Per Booking (vertical axis)
BPM = Bookings Per Match(line width)
AHS = Asian Handicap Swing i.e. the deviation from the expected result(vertical axis)
PPG = Points Per Game(line width)
Therefore a high thin line for FPB/BPM would indicate a lot of fouls and very little bookings – and a low thin line for AHS/PPG would indicate an underperformance against the betting line and very few points taken.

Andre Marriner has had 17 games for Wigan Athletic consisting of 6 wins, 8 draws and 3 losses.

Wigan Athletic are currently in 10th in Andre Marriner’s personal Points Per Game League (for teams with a minimum of 5 matches played), for matches in the EPL/ECH, with an average of 1.53 PPG.

In Andre Marriner’s personal Handicap Swing League (for teams with a minimum of 5 matches played), for matches in the EPL/ECH, Wigan Athletic come 6th with an average positive swing of 0.18.

Wigan Athletic are currently in 25th in Andre Marriner’s personal Booking’s Per Match League (for teams with a minimum of 5 matches played), for matches in the EPL/ECH, with an overall average of 1.88 BPM.

In Andre Marriner’s personal Fouls Per Booking League (for teams with a minimum of 5 matches played), for matches in the EPL/ECH, Wigan Athletic come 19th with an overall average of 6.91 FPB.

The colour of the line represents the player type.
The position of the line against the vertical axis will indicate the average time of the booking and the thickness of the line indicates the average number of bookings of players in that position.
Therefore a high fat orange line would indicate that the referee often books the specified teams defence out of the challenge early, a low thin line or no line would indicate the opposite.  The number of minutes bottoms out at 100 to indicate no bookings.

Above is a seasonal breakdown on how, when and where Wigan Athletic took all their bookings under Andre Marriner.

The colour of the line represents the player type.
The position of the line against the vertical axis will indicate the average time of the booking and the thickness of the line indicates the average number of bookings of players in that position.
Therefore a high fat orange line would indicate that the referee often books the specified teams defence out of the challenge early, a low thin line or no line would indicate the opposite.  The number of minutes bottoms out at 100 to indicate no bookings.

Above is a seasonal breakdown on how, when and where Wigan Athletic’s opposition took all their bookings under Andre Marriner.

Let’s move on now to check out how Andre Marriner performs against selected teams in the EPL:

The ine thickness represents the average Points Per Game and the position of the line against the vertical axis represents the average swing againd the handicap.

OK – there’s a few zero-point intersects that make this graph slightly un-intuitive to read i.e. in the 2006/2007 season for Arsenal, Chelsea and Wigan, the 2007/2008 season for Manchester United and the 2011/2012 season for Manchester City – these are because Andre Marriner didn’t have any games for these clubs in those seasons.

Given that – the standout performers are Manchester United. Wigan do OK but they are on a bit of a downer for the last few seasons. Arsenal have always had a good points return from Andre but we have seen a dip in performance from 2008/2009 to 2009/2010 – this season and last season, however, we have shown a solid over performance (in no small part due to the 7-1 drubbing of Blackburn Rovers and 3-5 win over Chelsea).

The Predictortron gives Arsenal a 3.641026 goal advantage… although I have a feeling that Wigan might try to frustrate us and see out a draw – if the bus is parked we will need a direct approach and an early goal or two to break their spirit and see out a valuable 3 points – we should get them I reckon.

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37 Replies to “RefWatch – Arsenal Vs Wigan Athletic (16/04/2012 – 20:00)”

  1. Looking forward to a great game tonight. Wigan have been putting double shifts in the past few weeks and I’m hoping they’ll run out of steam/ideas. A win is a win, but 5-0 would be nice.

  2. barring the game at ewood park Marriner seems to be okay in the other matches he has ref’d us and im really he keeps up today..expecting a 2-0 win

  3. Sorry – damn predictive texting – I meant ‘Officiate’ not ‘Fix’ – I’m not sure why it gets those two muddled up quite so often?!

  4. Phil I agree its a great article and im delighted they say that something has to change and havent missed Rooneys elbow to the head incident either.
    The excuse.
    Yes, they saw the flashpoint but they did not see it well enough.

    You either see something or you dont surely, I am not sure its possible to half see something. I caught it out the corner of my eye but didnt really see it means the panel should be able to make a decision on the incident.

    The big worrythough is this.

    In February, Benoît Assou-Ekotto went studs-up on Franco di Santo in Spurs’ home league game against Wigan and, despite the incident being reviewed, got away with it.

    I mean can the panel be relied upon ? what if its Rooney before a world cup and they dont want to ban him.

  5. @DogFace

    Are you using splines in that last plot of Referee versus EPL?

    Maybe when there are years where a referee didn’t officiate any games against a specific team, perhaps the thing to do is to fit the spline to the data present, and use that spline to predict a value to insert for the year in question. To indicate the data point is fabricated, have the intensity of the colour of the line go to zero in the vicinity of the fabricated data.

  6. @Gord – yeah, thought of that BUT it would require some bespoke work to the standard chart that would be a major pain in the arse.

  7. For those that like to see Arsenal players collect awards, Arsenal.com has the shortlists for Player of the Year and Young Player of the Year. Robin van Persie is on the Player of the Year shortlist, and Alexander Oxlade-Chamberlain is on the Youth Player of the Year list.

    http://www.arsenal.com/news/news-archive/van-persie-nominated-for-pfa-award

    @DogFace

    Not that I am suggesting you alter your standard chart, but the following might be of interest.

    If you are looking for a quite readable paper on spline smoothing of gridded data that can have missing values, and has Matlab code available, I found a paper from 2009.
    Robust smoothing of gridded data in one and higher dimensions with
    missing values
    Damien Garcia ∗
    CRCHUM – Research Centre, University of Montreal Hospital, Montreal, Canada
    Computational Statistics and Data Analysis 54 (2010) 1167–1178

    It is possible to find a PDF of that paper on the Internet.

  8. Mike Dean in the Chelsea match!

    Whoever it is behind these appointments they are taking the piss out of our club big time.

  9. @Tasos what they are doing is beyond taking the piss..its like they are saying fu to Arsenal,untold and supporters in general or else how could you explain us having Dean FOUR times in 13 matches? One time in a space of 3 matches is beyond pathetic

  10. ever since 22nd january this is the list of refs we had
    DEAN,Foy,Marriner,Swarbick,DEAN,Halsey,Webb,Mason,Dowd,DEAN,Atkinson,Swarbick,Marriner and now DEAN again.. Pathetic

  11. I share the same birth day with Andre, so let us hope it works for Arsenal. Good game gooners!!!

  12. @Mandy Dodd

    I think the PGMOL will appoint a ref who allows plenty of fouls for the Stoke match.
    Someone who rarely books players and also allows crunching tackles to take place.

    Step forward Mark Halsey

  13. Amazing how the media was able to foreshadow this result to such an extent…

    Did anyone see what happened to Arteta? Or hear any explanation of what had possibly happened to Arteta? Did anyone’s announcers even comment on this subject at all?

    Because I would like to at least know why it was that Arteta was out of commission for both of their goals. It might be nothing whatsoever… It really might be nothing. Seriously.

    But I would at least like to know why. And how it happened.

  14. Marriner was complete and utter shambles…walter was right they had to compensate wigan and it was us who had to be shafted…poor performance from us too and oh the AAA have gone into overdrive mode

  15. Impressive performance by Andre. How he thinks Walcott is flooring people with his size, but then easily shrugged to the floor when through on goal? Wigan played their hearts out, took advantage of Arteta’s injury with good finishing, and we were a little sluggish, especially in the second half, but ref influenced the game.

  16. Think arteta may have twisted a knee or ankle trying to cross but not sure.
    Marriner was not good look forward to the ref review. But basically, we switched off for a couple of mins and had to face a defensive wall and the odd dangerous counter attack.
    Points of worry….we had it in our hands, now top four could be in the hands of the pgmol, we must beat dean and Chelsea next game.
    Second, does anyone else think robin is carrying something, his movement did not look good, even though cos of the two mins of madness, they could put three on him, and get away with fouling him as well.
    Ultimately, we were not at our best this evening, and we do not get the help that others get when they are not at their best.
    We are partly to blame, we do sometimes have a tendency to shoot ourselves in the foot at crucial times, we certainly did that in this game.
    We must beat chelae, fortunately we are able to do just that.

  17. I think we are always “soft” against relegation-threathened teams.
    Blackburn 4-3 Arsenal, Arsenal 1-1 Wolves, Bolton 0-0 Arsenal,QPR 2-1 Arsenal and now Arsenal 1-2 Wigan. There are some serious points we are lost there. We should be more ruthless next season. It also doesn’t help when the refs don’t always went the right way. Next stop Chelsea pays us a visit. I have more confidence in us beating them provided they come to attack..

  18. @Anne

    This is from the BBC commentary (generic).
    > 2007: Mikel Arteta seems to have picked up a foot injury while he was trying to cross the ball following that free-kick. The Gunners are getting closer in his absence, though, with Yossi Benayoun (yes, Yossi Benayoun) forcing Ali Al Habsi into a fine reflex save with a header.

  19. The biggest advantage for us is that Chelsea play barcelona before us and will definitely be tired. We do miss Arteta and well just hoping that Chelsea don’t lose at home to Barca because if they do , then they might be dangerous to us knowing that only 4th place can bring them back to Champions League next year. Just for positive thoughts, let’s hope that Tottenham also lose to QPR on Saturday.
    Just positive thoughts and nothing else.

  20. Akasuna, think Chelsea’s main tactic will be drogba going down in the area with nobody within two yards of him and hoping mike dean does the rest.
    Hopefully barca will take it out of Chelsea to the degree that even dean cannot help them

  21. More bad news, Philippe auclair has tweeted that arteta in players lounge in a protective boot, shame, a great player for us this season. ….assuming this is accurate.
    A very bad evening all round. Unfortunately we have this predilection to going behind. We have been brilliant at coming back this season, but guess, like with QPR, we cannot,do it all the time. This is a part of our game we will have to iron out, we can make a lot of hard work for ourselves….and easy work for the pgmol.
    Another stat mentioned in today’s commentary….it has been a year since we have had a penalty at home. This is quite incredible, who says the more attacking teams get the pens?

  22. Sorry for being the messenger of doom, just read jack will not play in the euros, not exactly unexpected.
    With arteta seemingly out, we could do with a returning diaby

  23. i cant believe what utter twats we have that call themselves gooners..the vile abuse Ramsey is getting on twitter atm is way too infuriating..people sending him death threats and others tweeting they would gladly break his legs if it meant he didnt play again and even more disgusting tweets…SMH

  24. Think most of them are just a bunch of worried embittered spuds Mahdain, a few trolls make a lot of noise.

  25. well after finally getting home from the match a little deflated and more than a little drunk. I think you can look at the match in two ways…

    1. Arsenal failed to create enough chances and lacked any kind of impetus.
    This will be the media spin the morning, followed by the usual bollocks about our season being over.

    2. Arsenal were poor, but the ref found any excuse to break up an Arsenal attack. The proof of this will be from the team of Ref reviewers.

    Personally its a little from column A, and a little dash of column B.

    Reading Young Gun’s twitter feed we have
    “Aaron Ramsey statistically sound: 89% pass accuracy, 92 touches, 3 long balls, 2 dribbles, 1 interception, won 1 aerial duel.”
    Yes, Aaron’s passing was good, but it wasnt very decisive and for me this was the main issue. He slowed down play, rather than playing the ball over the top for RVP or Theo. For me this is a real concern for Sat.

    I would like to point out that Im not ‘picking’ on Aaron and I certainly dont wish him ill. I just wish tonight that someone had shoved a foot up his ass to give our play some impetus.

  26. For a moment, it looked like it was Dean who was refereeing. The ’tilting’ is becoming obvious now. Calling all the little fouls in Wigan’s favour, well someone had to pay for Ref’s mistakes against Wigan these last few weeks; who better than Arsenal? In any case, we just saw what an important player Arteta is. Without him, we did not have intensity of passing that we would normally have. Life’s going to suck for next couple of days 🙁

  27. Looking around, nothing gets the aaa up early like an arsenal defeat! Suppose a portion of them are still livid after the five one thrashing to chelsea.
    Speaking of Chelsea, recent results and this ref appointment suggest they have friends in places. I still think we will be ok. The Wigan game was down to two minutes of defensive madness as we dealt with an injury. No it should not have happened, and yes that sort of thing happens too often with us. Wigan also played quite an exotic tactical formation, again we have sometimes struggled against that type of thing , again something that needs looking at, maybe quite urgently.
    But we know what we will get with Chelsea and dean. We should also have our first choice defence. That defence yesterday have only played together a couple of times, and at times, it did show.Hopefully, by rights they will have miked suspended. We need more pace than against Wigan, but we should not be over
    run in mf against Chelsea, in fact far from it.
    But…however the media and aaa spin it, we were outdone by a couple mins of self inflicted madness, but we still could have won the game. Especially in the first half.Did not help a ref finally dealing with time wasting in the 92nd minute…to please his assessors having already pleased his pay masters….a ref who did all he could to break up our attacks.
    We can still recover and put our finish in our own destiny, rather than that the pgmol clearly want for us, but after that game, it just got a little more difficult.

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