by Andrew Crawshaw
Here courtesy of premierleague.com are the matches and officials for this weekend’s games. Please note that kickoffs are at 15:00 unless otherwise stated. Where no Predictions article is listed, it will be added in the course of the next day or so on the Predictions website.
Saturday 12 January
12:30 West Ham United v Arsenal
Referee: Jonathan Moss
Assistants: Marc Perry, Andy Halliday
Fourth official: Stuart Attwell
Brighton v Liverpool
Referee: Kevin Friend
Assistants: Simon Long, Richard West
Fourth official: Roger East
Burnley v Fulham
Referee: Martin Atkinson
Assistants: Constantine Hatzidakis, Harry Lennard
Fourth official: Anthony Taylor
Cardiff v Huddersfield Town
Referee: Lee Mason
Assistants: Stuart Burt, Matthew Wilkes
Fourth official: Andre Marriner
Crystal Palace v Watford
Referee: Paul Tierney
Assistants: Ian Hussin, Simon Beck
Fourth official: Simon Hooper
Leicester v Southampton
Referee: Michael Oliver
Assistants: Simon Bennett, Mick McDonough
Fourth official: David Coote
17:30 Chelsea v Newcastle United
Referee: Chris Kavanagh
Assistants: Daniel Cook, Sian Massey-Ellis
Fourth official: Craig Pawson
Sunday 13 January
14:15 Everton v AFC Bournemouth
Referee: Anthony Taylor
Assistants: Gary Beswick, Adam Nunn
Fourth official: Martin Atkinson
16:30 Tottenham Hotspur v Man Utd
Referee: Mike Dean (pictured)
Assistants: Darren Cann, Dan Robathan
Fourth official: Andre Marriner
Monday 14 January
20:00 Man City v Wolverhampton
Referee: Craig Pawson
Assistants: Lee Betts, Eddie Smart
Fourth official: Chris Kavanagh
In our game against Fulham for the first time this season we went the whole game without getting a player booked. We were called for 7 fouls as against 12 for Fulham who picked up one booking.
Spurs join the ‘four times club’ this weekend for their Monday Night game against Man United as Mike Dean has been appointed for that game. I think that Spurs probably dislike him almost as much as we do. In their three previous matches under his whistle they beat Cardiff one nil at home, Beat Wolves 3 – 2 away and lost 4 – 2 at the Emirates, hardly all conquering form. United have had him twice already, a 2 – 1 away win at Watford and a 2 – 2 draw at Chelsea. Could be a close game (I wonder what the PGMO wishes are?).
For our 12:30 Saturday kick-off against West Ham we have Jonathan Moss in charge. He was also in charge of our earlier home game against Everton on 22 September when he gave us two yellow cards (in the 15th and 30th minutes for a total time under caution of 135 minutes). He gave Everton one in the 27th minute. He called 17 fouls against Arsenal and 12 against Everton.
This will be the first time this season that West Ham have had the ‘pleasure’ of his company
He is a pernickerty referee who often looks as though he is completely out of his depth, he calls lots of little fouls whilst not recognising which, if any, should deserve a bigger sanction. He also struggles to keep up with play so is frequently making decisions from an inadequate viewpoint; not a good trait.
He is usually trusted by The PGMO to deliver the right result so it is important that we start quickly for once and effectively put sufficient daylight between us and West Ham so that the usual refereeing tricks become pointless.
If we don’t make the quick start, expect phantom fouls, poor advantages, West Ham fouls going unpunished, the usual offside goal and all of the other tricks of the trade.
COYG
Despite Jonathan Moss, one of the well known anti-Arsenal match referee in the PL at the Pgmo being the centre referee in the Gunners match away to the Irons at the London Stadium tomorrow Saturday afternoon in the PL, notwithstanding, if everything happens for Arsenal in this match according to the plan put in place by Arsenal to play the match and win it comfortably. Then, on getting to the field of play starting to play the match, Arsenal will at guns point collect all the hammers that are in the hands of the West Hammers and start hammering them thoroughly with the hammers bending them in the game to render they the West Hammers crooked and incapable of resisting the Gunners from attacking and beating them heavily in the game to the collection of all the priced spoils 3 points that are at stake for collection in the match. And if I may add, Arsenal are reported to have said they are not interested in sharing the spoils in the match with the West Hammers but take all the spoils 3 points away to the Emirates Stadium when returning back to North London after battling to success in the match. Thus the Gunners rejection of the overtures of the Irons to the Gunners in it’s totality to have the spoils in the match shared as it has been reported in the football grapevine media outlet this Friday afternoon today. Hmmm.
StateAid (1459:26:-22) v Arsenal (1530:31:-20) under Jonathon Moss 6th:25 (9:16 18:31 1:5)
There might be a tendency for Moss to be harder on the Away team, which probably will happen.
Brighton (1495:24:-21) v Liverpool (726:18:-21) under Kevin Friend 3th:31 (17:14 37:19 4:1)
There might be a tendency for Friend to be harder on the Home team, and nobody cards Liverpool.
Burnley (1401:17:-17) v Fulham (1480:19:-22) under Martin Atkinson 1th:35 (19:16 41:41 5:4)
Atkinson seems to be equally hard on everyone, and he leads the referees with the most treatments supervised.
Leicester (1327:18:-10) v Southampton (1239:27:-21) under Michael Oliver 5th:29 (13:16 20:26 3:5)
Oliver almost equally treats Home v Away. Leicester is second lowest at inflicting treatments, so Southampton not likely to get kicked.
Spuds (1087:17:-28) v ManU (1774:13:-27) under Mike Dean 8th:22 (15:7 26:12 4:3)
Spuds and ManU lead the league in inflicting treatments, but the Spuds seldom get called for fouls or carded. Dean tends to be slightly harder on the home team.