by Tony Attwood
Imagine that there were a set of statistics that indicated that for years and years referees had been unduly under the influence of alcohol when refereeing Premier League matches.
After years of hiding the figures the situation would now be incredibly difficult – because if those figures did come out then questions would be asked not only about why the bias they reveal is taking place, but also why it was not discussed before.
So what could be done?
Well, ideally, with the collusion of the media, the figures could be ignored. And this is what is happening with the issue of home and away wins in the Premier League. (Although not the bit about alcohol).
Last night’s result of Manchester United 1 Sheffield United 2 took the media by surprise, and they really didn’t know how to explain it. The Guardian led with “Burke winner damages title chasers hopes” which seemed a little less than surprised.
The Daily Mail has run the headline “Rio Ferdinand labels Manchester United as ‘dour and lifeless’ after Ole Gunnar Solskjaer’s men are beaten at home by Premier League basement boys Sheffield United… as he blasts Anthony Martial and Nemanja Matic for lacklustre display in Blades winner”
The Daily Express has “Ole Gunnar Solskjaer makes Man Utd vow over Arsenal clash after Sheff Utd deal title blow”
None of them, nor indeed any of the other papers that I have seen reflected on the way that away wins were now more common than home wins.
Indeed the reverse pattern has always been the case since the football league started. In the very first season of the Football League (1888/9) the figures ran out as
- Home wins: 59%
- Draws: 17%
- Away wins: 24%
That pattern of most games ending as home wins, followed by away wins and then a smaller percentage ending as draws continued, year after year until last season. Yes, once or twice over the years there were minor blips as the away wins and draws crept up, and home wins declined, but all those did were to even up the stats slightly for one season, before the numbers retreated once more to the normal pattern.
This season, excluding last night’s games we have had 194 games played. 73 have been home wins, 76 away wins and 45 were draws.
Which in percentage terms works out at
- Home wins: 38%
- Away wins: 39%
- Draws: 23%
Now if we go back to 2018/19, the last season in which we had crowds attending matches we had 380 games 181 home wins, 128 away wins and 71 draws.
In percentages that gives
- Home wins: 47%
- Away wins: 34%
- Draws: 19%
These are extraordinary figures, and yet apart from one rather desperate attempt by the Guardian to deny this was happening it is not an issue for the media. Even though, as we have shown, it is happening across the leagues in this country.
Indeed there was even an utterly bizarre attempt by the media to suggest that this rise in away wins that their readers may have heard about was now over, and everything was back to normal. In fact what the article did was take figures from European leagues where indeed the percentages of home and away wins (which have always been different from the Premier League) had reverted to normal. In the Premier League the blip continues.
Which raises three questions:
1: Why is this happening in the Premier League?
2: Why are the media not reporting it?
3: When crowds return will we get a return to the dominance of home wins that has dominated English League football for over 100 years?
The answer to question one (why is this happening) is the key, of course. Large amounts of research have shown that referees are influenced by the home crowd, and that results in the dominance of home wins. The article Crowdless stadia stats reveal fallacy of PGMO claims about referee accuracy has the details.
Why the media are not reporting it is twofold. One because they like to treat us as morons, and two because this would mean admitting that there is something seriously wrong with refereeing, which they won’t admit. Even when we showed that PL refs make almost 3 times as many errors per game as Swiss refs they wouldn’t touch it.
The other is because the media like to keep in with the PGMO who are never ever questioned or criticised.
Arsenal are a typical team in this regard with a slightly better away for than home.
| Pos | Home / away | P | W | D | L | F | A | GD | Pts |
| 9 | Arsenal home | 10 | 4 | 2 | 4 | 12 | 11 | 1 | 14 |
| 8 | Arsenal away | 10 | 5 | 1 | 4 | 14 | 9 | 5 | 16 |
If our form continues along the lines we have seen in the last six league games (five wins one draw) it could see us rise up the table. Not to win the league of course, we are too far behind, but we might get to a place where we could say we have not won a trophy.
I don’t think the change of percentage is completely down to the influence (or lack of it) of crowd on the referees. Whilst it does make a difference at the refereeing performances, no one can’t ignore that home teams no longer have that extra percentage of adrenaline injected by the supporters and suddenly, teams like Liverpool (last season they dropped two points at home and it happened after the restart when the crowd weren’t allowed) lose the home ground advantage. That’s why technical superiority of Man City has been a major factor since the restart comparing to the pressing-reliant football of Liverpool – they have won six games with a 5-0 scoreline which means they win every fifth game with that scoreline.
I recall of that famous game against Leicester in 2015-16 when Welbeck scored a winner. The referee Atkinson was his usual self-centered incompetent anti-Arsenal biased creature but it was the Emirates crowd that acted like our 12th player and eventually led our players to the victorious come-back.
Yawn, boring. Your usual conspiracy theory nonsense. Write about something else. Get a life!
The title of your piece might also refer to UEFA with their so called laughable & derisory attempts to ignore the current debts their two favourite clubs are masking with over a Billion each & close to bankruptcy.yes you heard it right .A billion plus each.Yes of course.The two clubs to which the riules don’t apply.I give you Real Madrid & Barcelona.Perhaps Swiss Ramble could do a guest piece on them.would be lovely to read.
A very interesting comment. Here you are, Andrew, with the chance of reading any of 100 or more blogs on Arsenal, and you choose us, in order to say, “usual conspiracy theory nonsense.” Yet you not only provide no evidence as to why it is nonsense, when we in fact have provided in the past few months a mountain of data, you merely say “Get a life”
But what puzzles me is what sort of life you have, a life which draws you to reading Untold which is seems you can predict (you do call is the “usual” type of article.)
So here’s the thing: you claim you know what to expect, you claim it is nonsense, you claim we have no life, and yet you do it. Again and again.
Which raises the question, who is it without a life? Those of us who bother to do research, study the figures, and realise that something odd is going on and seek to resolve it? Or you, who find the whole thing nonsense – and yet come back here, over and over again. And not only that, take up more time in writing to us.
I’m really puzzled, which since my university subject was psychology is saying something. Can you explain your behaviour?
I was indeed reading a long piece about their debts. I think they fall into the too big to fail category. I’m looking to put a piece together on this now.
Andrew Banks
To be honest people like you make me laugh. 14 words to dispel pages and pages of data. Really ?
But hey, you’re entitled to your opinion, so lets just take your accusation of a Conspiracy Theory and see how it holds up.
So, first of all what exactly is a conspiracy theory ? From Wiki:
“A conspiracy theory is an explanation for an event or situation that invokes a conspiracy by sinister and powerful groups, often political in motivation, when other explanations are more probable. The term has a negative connotation, implying that the appeal to a conspiracy is based on prejudice or insufficient evidence”
Lets break that down.
a) by sinister and powerful groups
Well unless you’re a bit odd I fail to see how you can class Untold Arsenal as either Sinister, or, and I’m sorry Tony, Powerful ?
b) often political in motivation
Sorry, cant see Untold being politically motivated.
c) when other explanations are more probable
Well of course there maybe other more probable explanations but you have clearly failed to provide any.
d) The term has a negative connotation, implying that the appeal to a conspiracy is based on prejudice or insufficient evidence.
Hmm, insufficient evidence? As Tony says, this site has provided mountains of evidence.
So I’m sorry, but I fail to see how your accusation of this being a ‘Conspiracy Theory’ has any credibility what so ever.
But it is what it is and I’m sure you’ll be able to explain exactly why it is a conspiracy theory, and of course provide another explanation to support your explanation.
“But it is what it is and I’m sure you’ll be able to explain exactly why it is a conspiracy theory, and of course provide another explanation to support your explanation”.
Or not as the case maybe.