Arsenal v Everton Saturday 24 October – The Match Officials
by Andrew Crawshaw
No new Referee Reviews from Usama and Walter so no update to this season’s table of Shame
| Wrong Important Decisions | Favouring Arsenal | Favouring Opponents |
| 2nd Yellow Cards | 0 | 11 |
| Red Cards | 0 | 6 |
| Penalties | 0 | 7 |
| Goals | 0 | 3 |
| Total | 0 | 27 |
| Possible Cost in Points | 0 | 6 |
The officials on Saturday are
- Referee – Lee Mason
- Assistants – S Beck and A Garratt
- Fourth Official – A Taylor
A reminder of Mr Mason’s performances in Arsenal games last year
| Referee | Correct total | Wrong total |
| Lee Mason | 86.44% | 13.56% |
| Moss | 83.17% | 16.83% |
| Pawson | 80.82% | 19.18% |
| Clattenberg | 78.85% | 21.15% |
| Oliver | 78.18% | 21.82% |
| Dowd | 73.44% | 26.56% |
| Taylor | 72.88% | 27.12% |
| Friend | 70.59% | 29.41% |
| Marriner | 70.42% | 29.58% |
| Jones | 70.00% | 30.00% |
| East | 67.92% | 32.08% |
| Dean | 67.37% | 32.63% |
| Atkinson | 66.47% | 33.53% |
So statistically Mr Mason was the best referee in Arsenal games last season getting over 85% of his calls right (unweighted).
This is Mr Mason’s fourth game in the Premier League this year, his second involving Arsenal. He officiated in matchweeks 1 and 2 when he was on hand Crystal Palace when we won 2 – 1, he was then rested until matchweek 7 when he did Stoke v Bournemouth and again rested till this weekend. He has continued to act as fourth official in weeks 2, 3 4 (twice), 5, 6 and 9 so clearly hasn’t been entirely in the PGMO doghouse. He did get an extraordinary degree of castigation in the media for not sending off Coquelin against Palace.
Here is the link to the referee review of the Palace Game.
| The most detailed Referee Reviews in the history of football: Crystal Palace – Arsenal |
Extracting the detail for fouls by Coquelin we see the following :-
Min 24 Foul 1 – correctly called (tug and pull of the back of Puncheon’s shirt)
Min 41 Foul 2 – correctly called (Bolase jumped over an attempted sliding tackle which Coquelin was already pulling out of. As he landed Bolase landed on Coquelin’s left foot and fell down). A yellow card was wrongly issued to Coquelin.
Min 45 Foul 3 – Coquelin touched Zaha who fell to the ground. Referee given benefit of the doubt in correctly awarding a foul
Min 62 Foul 4 – correctly called (little nudge in the back of McArthur)
So Coquelin made a total of four fouls in the whole game, none of which our reviewers deemed worthy of a yellow let alone a red card. Hardly enough for a media witch hunt (but then as we often say that never stops the lazy hacks from presenting an anti-Arsenal point of view). In terms of ‘totting up’ perhaps a yellow card for the fourth card would have been appropriate but certainly there was absolutely no case for a red card at any point.
His weighted score was a disappointing 66%, bias against the two teams was 10/90 and he made two wrong Important Decisions when he failed to award Arsenal penalties in Minute 7 Puncheon on Alexis and Min 84 Delaney on Giroud.
Here is a link to my referee preview for that game, I really don’t feel I need to go over all of the same ground this quickly so please follow the link for the full background.
Palace v Arsenal: 16 August 2015 – The Match Officials
A note about the Assistant referees – both have flags against them for poor performances in past games, particularly offside decisions that led to goals being wrongly allowed or incorrectly dis-allowed.
We also have Anthony Taylor as Fourth official – never good news
I will repeat my conclusions from that preview virtually verbatim because I haven’t seen anything that changes my opinion in any way. I have however added a new point 1.
Conclusions
- With the bad press that Mr Mason got for not sending off Coquelin against Palace, our players will have to be doubly vigilant not to give him any opportunity this Saturday. I’m sure his instructions will have been made quite clear to him by his employers that Arsenal should have at least one player sent off. His Assistants and Fourth Official all have history of making extraordinary cock-ups in Arsenal games and the whole bunch of them really have no right to be trusted. For Mr Mason to be back so soon is in itself suspicious and the crowd will have to really get on his case if he starts to mis-behave.
- Mr Mason is a referee we normally get away from home (2 home games and 7 away games since the start of the 2012 season)
- His competence numbers are usually high but his judgement on Important Decisions (second yellow cards, red cards, penalties and goals) is nowhere near as good. He is another referee who seems incapable of recognising a really bad challenge when one is made in front of his nose and another referee where I will be glad when the game is over and we have no serious injuries.
- Mr Mason can, on occasions be OK as a referee. Unfortunately all too frequently he follows the lead of his bosses at the PGMO and exhibits a terrible anti-Arsenal bias, particularly with Important Decisions.
- Don’t expect to see an Arsenal Penalty.
- Don’t expect to see Everton players given yellow cards yet alone red.
- Do look out for a phantom foul called on Arsenal in a position where Palace can cross the ball into our area and then look out for non called fouls on our defenders. His other favourite trick is to ignore a foul by a palace player in a dangerous position.
- As with all referees out players will be given yellow cards at the earliest possible opportunity.
- Mr Mason is a typical PGMO employee, rabidly anti-Arsenal and capable of just about anything.
COYG
From the anniversary files
- 23 October 1999: “With 15 minutes left they trailed 2-0 to a Chelsea team who hadn’t conceded at home all season. Arsène Wenger feared for his season, and what happened next aged him 10 years.” (Report on Kanu scoring 3 in the Observer, 24 Oct)
- 23 October 2007: Jens Lehmann made an infamous speech in which he spoke of “my dear manager” and detailed the “humiliation” he felt of being dropped. Mr Wenger said later that “Jens always thought he was right about everything”.
You can find all the Arsenal Anniversaries on Arsenal On This Day and the daily full list of anniversaries on Untold Arsenal
.
.
Andrew, thanks for all the ref previews.
A brief note: at point 7 you still refer to Palace, instead of Everton.
Thank you Andrew, the fallout from Coq/Palace is a concern but hopefully our good form will see us through.
Quite amazing but sadly, utterly believable claims from a Spanish linesman who reports the Spanish referee association has put pressure on him to favour Madrid in the upcoming El Classico.
If true, and this will be hard to prove without a recorded phone call…it begs the question …why are the Spanish PGMOL getting involved in such things, and who are they answering to….questions I would like to ask of Rileys mob.
Thanks Andrew.
Myself and a few others have expressed a lot of concern regarding how Mason will handle the match this weekend, considering he was effectively ‘banned’ for seeming to favour Arsenal at Crystal Palace.
Relating to that I questioned whether anyone in the media, anyone in fact, would pick up on the possible ramifications for Arsenal, considering Mason will effectively be on trial.
Well I haven’t seen it. In fact quite the opposite.
As you may of seen I have been referencing a site called ‘You are the Ref.com’
This is how they see themselves:
“”Our role is to supplement the standard programmes offered by national federations and provide unrivalled analysis, education and insight to colleagues seeking to achieve the standards they set for themselves.
We are not constrained by the politics of national referee administration and as the truly independent commentator on all match official issues we can observe openly on all aspects of the game, with authority.
At our very core is education. All our insight, all our analysis is about improving understanding and standards.””
all very grand, then we get this garbage. Very analytical I don’t think.
Apparently it’s Everton that have to worry.
THIS IS YOUR CRITIQUE OF THE EVENTS AT SELHURST PARK:
Min 24 Foul 1 – correctly called (tug and pull of the back of Puncheon’s shirt)
Min 41 Foul 2 – correctly called (Bolase jumped over an attempted sliding tackle which Coquelin was already pulling out of. As he landed Bolase landed on Coquelin’s left foot and fell down). A yellow card was wrongly issued to Coquelin.
Min 45 Foul 3 – Coquelin touched Zaha who fell to the ground. Referee given benefit of the doubt in correctly awarding a foul
Min 62 Foul 4 – correctly called (little nudge in the back of McArthur)
THIS IS WHOS THE REF.COMS TAKE ON THOSE SAME EVENTS AS RELATED IN THERE MATCH PREVIEW:
“Lee Mason: Arsenal v Everton
Assistants: S. Beck and A. Garratt
Fourth official: A. Taylor
Can Roberto Martinez be happy about the appointment of an official who Crystal Palace fans dubbed ‘Arsenal’s signing of the season?’
The official was in a charitable mood and was heavily criticised for his failure to send off Francis Coquelin for some crude challenges.
Mason’s fitness has been in question for some while, and with a fast-paced game expected, can he keep up with the play to ensure fair play?”
–This Mason appointment is nothing short of a disgrace. Yet not a word about the possible ramifications to Arsenal. In fact, as I say, the complete opposite.
When a so called independent organisation such as this fails to do anymore than tow the line what chance have we got.
By the way, sorry the above is basically a repeat of something I posted on the ‘on the road…’ thread but the ref review came up just after I posted and I felt it pertinent to this thread. Sorry.
@Jambug
October 23, 2015 at 2:21 pm
There will be complete control of games by PGMOL, The media/plundits and now it seems ‘independent’ outfits such as the one you have shown…UNTIL Video Technology.
There is no way these cheats will get out of their seats until that day unfortunately.
Mandy – I think we’ve missed a trick here. The obvious way to raise the catalogue of bias and incompetence would have been for a shareholder to ask Ivan Gazidis a question about it at the AGM.
I guess that is it for the year. Shareholders attending next time should definitely be prepped (assuming that the whole thing hasn’t blown up by then).
Mason is another from the Manchester/Liverpool connection.
However, I thought he did us a couple of favours in that Crystal Palace game. I suspect that may have been because of the way the Palace players, cheered on by Pardew, were trying to get Coquelin sent off. Some of the theatrics were embarrassing and yet again the media failed to report the match in abalanced fashion.
And yet, I can’t bring myself to hate Everton. In my mind they were royally screwed by the Liverpool fans in the 80s when England were banned from Europe. They have the second longest run in the top tier of English football. I don’t want to be screwed over by the refs but I can’t say that Everton (poor people having to share a city with the red Scousers) have been great beneficiaries of the refereeing cabal’s largesse.
GoingGoingGooner
I agree. I have no axe to grind with Everton. Quite the opposite actually, because as you say, sharing a City with the media obsession that is Liverpool FC must be very difficult.
I also quite like Martinez.
The thing is, unless the Everton players are all sharing just the one brain cell, they must realise the pressure Mason will be under to impose the letter of the law upon Arsenal in general, and Coquelin in particular, at every opportunity.
Martinez and his players must be aware.
We’ll just have to hope they are not cynical enough to try to take advantage of this disgraceful situation.
In a way it’s not fair on the Everton players either, because the temptation has been put under there nose.
When you consider the sense of injustice they must still be harbouring from last Decembers class with Stoke, a match in which Mason well and truly stitched them up, the temptation will surely be there.
We can only hope.
Corr…Last Decembers clash with Stoke.
The appointment of Mason clearly demonstrates the arrogance (self-confidence) of Goblin Emperor Riley. He can conduct his corrupt agenda in plain sight. Barely a word in the media, yet I bet the bookies tills are ringing loudly. I pray that we are now on such an effective run, that we are ready for any of this appalling cheating. It would be too obvious to send off Coq, so Kos is a good bet. Having Taylor and the useless linesmen on the touchline is a real boon to the circus. Look out my wonderful team, do not get shafted again by pigmol.
Maybe the 106k signatories to the anti Dean petition, should have a flutter on an Everton win tomorrow. Surely that would spark an “unusual betting patter” investigation?
OT, but Cech by now has his personal reasons to hate Mike Riley. Just saw the video.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rgX1Yb9p5b8
Useless Mike Riley….
Hi Genorm,
I like the name pigmol. Maybe we should expand it to PiGMOLe
Currently on Sky Bet – you can get Everton to win at 6-1 which is pretty good odds if the result is already decided 😉