Ref for this match was Neil Swarbrick
The first minute the ref should have booked O Brien who came in frontal towards Monreal. In control but surely with studs showing over the ground. A booking would have been the only correct call even in the first minute.
Minutes later a very important call to make for the assistant and the ref. Song’s distance shot went in but the assistant raised his flag. One West Ham player (Carroll) was just offside in front of Szczesny and blocked his view. Two other WHU players moved back from an offside position and one jumped and made a movement towards the ball. So he did have an influence and was interfering with the ball and his opponents. But we have seen them not given so a bit thumbs up for the assistant and the ref for this decision.
Then the ref saw a few fouls from Arsenal players where there was nothing to be seen and even WHU players not claiming a foul.
The penalty was a clear penalty. Reid lifted his leg to make sure that Cazorlo could not go further. There was another WH defender in the back of Cazorla so no red card but surely a yellow as it was a very promising attack.
So a good score of 81% and the same if we put weight on the decisions. Missing the yellows made his score on the important decisions drop to 66%.
In the second half he was having a rather good match till the final 10 minutes or so. Giving a throw in to WH when the West Ham player first walked away from the ball thinking it would be an Arsenal throw was strange. And we had Reid stopping the ball with his hands in front of his chest and then the ref letting him continue was also strange. Missing a foul of the ball from Song on Chamberlain when Arsenal could have had a possible promising attack… Then it was getting a bit bizarre.
Chamberlain then was pushed outside the penalty area, tried to continue but he couldn’t stay on his feet and again the ref let it go. On the other side he gave fouls to WH. It didn’t work out that way as the Arsenal defence hold on to the lead.
Score in the second half 70.83% and if we put weight on it it goes up to 77%. This shows that a lot of his more important decisions were right. Looking only at the important decisions we see a score of 85%. So he didn’t want to be in the spotlight for messing it up completely.
The total score over the whole match was 70% and when we put weight on the decisions it even goes up to almost 80%. In the important decisions we see a good total score of almost 77%. Well, good is relatively speaking of course compared to what we have seen otherwise.
The bias numbers are showing a 90% bias in favour of West Ham. So in that department it was business as usual one could say.
Some good decisions on the important ones but also a lot of “help” for West Ham to be able to throw the ball high in the penalty box. And letting go and not giving a few obvious decisions that even blind man could see in favour of Arsenal. That threw a shadow on his performance that wasn’t too bad in total.
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good article but you forgot one imortant incident when arsenal were awarded a free-kick of which alexis scored from it the hams players ‘s wall was ahead of the ref’s powder but ref just ignored that
I’ve had to delete quite a few comments which reveal that the writer didn’t actually read the guidelines on commentary.
But even so, why do some people think that being rude to a writer is a good way to a) communicate and b) get your comment published?
@Tony Attwood
January 16, 2015 at 4:59 pm
These are now the same ‘adults’ that once were in classrooms but never paid attention…the result is very obvious 😉
I have to proceed carefully with comments as I fear being banned but I will say once again that all this maybe sterling work conclusions about a ref’s performance are made whilst watching a game from angles not available to the ref and replays, again that the ref has no access to. I often wonder if Walter had actually refereed the game whether all his actual decisions would tally with his ones made as an observer. It’s impossible to replicate the actual ref experience with that experience of watching the game and having the luxury of relaying incidents time and time again.
Also to suggest anti Arsenal bias you’d have to judge every single game in the EPL. Not an impossible task but an exhaustive one but you need comparisons to support your theory. Maybe you could get away with just monitoring 70% of games every season but that still wouldn’t satisfy many.
I also take issue with a comment Walter made about refs being told by Riley to use the infamous game 50 as a blueprint for officiating. What proof has he of this?
I imagine Riley has reffed hundreds of games and though THAT game is infamous, at least to Arsenal fans, I wonder how relevant it is to Riley himself.
“replaying incidents” should read and “that although this maybe sterling work…”
Chapman’s Ghost:
I am sorry to say you have got it wrong, but I will try and explain.
The issue of errors by referees is measured against the PGMO proclamation of accuracy levels in the high 90s. They review the game on film, do not take into account what the ref can and can’t see, and then proclaim that the ref gets 97% or accurate.
We do the same, and come up with a much much lower figure. We are comparing like with like and saying that the PGMO is wrong, but that its secrecy stops us opening a proper debate with them.
The other point concerning your worry about being banned is that you simply won’t read and digest the fairly simple list of points made in our rules about comments.
http://untold-arsenal.com/untold-comments. Here is an extract
6. Suggest that the whole basis of scientific enquiry (by taking samples and generalising from them outwards) is false. If you feel our sample is warped, that’s another matter, but the essence of the scientific method is not one we are going to argue about. It is simply too well established throughout western civilisation to be countered in a football site. Try “Nature” or “New Scientist” instead.
There has been a long, long debate on this with a correspondent who suggested as you that sampling is not viable. I can’t imagine how you explain the very accurate predictions made in the UK for general elections, in which a sample of 1500 manages to predict the outcome in an electorate of 60 million, but it does.
But even then, with the time we ran Referee Decisions (still available on the internet) we had refs who supported many different clubs, and who were from all over the country, doing multiple games each week. We didn’t cover all of them but did a very large number. And still got the same results.
@Tony Attwood, you’ve explained it very well thanks. I don’t think the comparison with predicting elections stands but then I find all comparisons lack verity, no two things are so alike they bear comparing, if you get my drift.
Anyway you have clarified your position on judging refs performances. On as much as you can judge any performance with the luxury of access to replays, different camera angles etc., all of which the ref cannot utilise, I’m sure you do your best to be fair but I still find it hard to pass judgement on every decision that’s wrong and declare that, especially if it’s against Arsenal, it’s intentional and in collusion with some master plan to upend Arsenal’s fortunes.
My problem with that conclusion is exactly what is the point? Arsenal have a fairly formidable squad when it’s fit but all our best players rarely are, at least all at the same time. Even then it’s not the equal of City’s or Chelsea’s. Wenger has set himself a timetable to win the league, which he has made himself a hostage to, and it’s two years away. So it seems he’s aware of the team’s shortcomings. Nobody who has been watching football for years thought we’d win the league this year unless they were plagued with permanent optimism. So what is the object of picking on Arsenal? To stop us getting fourth, well we do that every year recently so that plan has failed. It’s quite the mystery.
I do agree that the standard of officiating is poor, perhaps it was ever thus, and some refs need to be banished to the dark hinterlands of the non league.
And Walter has yet to explain his bizarre blueprint comment.
If I maybe a little cheeky and off the point, my apologies, but I notice Tony that you suggested that Bergkamp and Henry were fading players when we bought them. I find this a very strange comment. I only recall immense excitement at our signing Bergkamp, similar to my pleasure at our signing Platt not so long before, I’d hardly say he was fading. And I’m not sure you can say that Henry who was about 21 and a World Cup winner was fading, not sure any footballer so young deserves that dismissive jibe. And both cost a fair bit.
Chapmans Ghost, Bergkamp had a torrid time in Italy – it was so bad that in his second season at Inter, he scored five goals in 26 games se of his poor performance on the pitch, one Italian publication renamed the award L’asino della settimana (Donkey of the Week) to Bergkamp della settimana.
Well Tony I wasn’t really bothered by what Bergkamp did in Italy, he was a quality player in my view and I haven’t forgotten my elation at his joining us. I recall some papers calling Tony Adams a donkey but he was pretty useful notwithstanding his personal demons.