The yellow card count this season is truly weird. So what’s going on with the refs?

By Tony Attwood

I don’t think I have ever seen an analysis of yellow cards year by year, and so I’ve just undertaken one using the Premier League’s own list of who gets carded.

Now research students at university are always told not to gather data just to see what it looks like.  No, you gather data to prove or disprove a point.  And my point was that Arsenal had proven that it was possible to cut the cards received, by analysing referee behaviour, and that it is therefore likely that a) other clubs would now copy this and b) referees, having seen what Arsenal were doing, would start laying into the club by upping the number of cards.

Because we are just part way through the 2021/2 season with everyone having played 11 games (29% of their total number of league games) I not only recorded the number of yellow cards so far, but also (in the second column with the * throughout) multiplied up, to see how many yellows they will get by the end of the season if they carry on at the current rate.

At the foot of the table I have noted the highest number of yellow cards for one club, and then the lowest number of cards.  Where one of the selected clubs has had either the highest or lowest number for that season their number is in bold.  All totals are for yellow cards only.

Club	2021/22	2021/2 E*	2020/21	2019/20	2018/19	2017/18	2016/17
Arsenal	17	58*	47	86	72	57	68
Chelsea	12	41*	50	60	49	42	72
Liverpool	12	41*	40	38	38	44	54
Man C	18	62*	46	60	44	59	71
Man U	25	86*	64	73	73	64	78
Tottenham	21	72*	53	82	56	50	62
Most	30	103*	73	86	77	73	84
Least	12	41*	40	38	38	42	52
Gap	18	62*	33	48	39	31	16

2021/2E* – this figure is an estimate of the number of yellow cards that each club will get by the end of this season, based on the number of cards after 11 games.

What the table tells us – overall

The gap between the most penalised and the least penalised club jumped up in 2017/18 but has stayed roughly in the same position ever since… until now.  If the current trends continue for the rest of this season one club could reach an all time record 103 yellow cards.  The club getting the least yellow cards will however have a normal number for the least cards – 41 (compared to a range of 38 to 42 in the last four years).  So the explosion in card giving is just at the top end of the table – which itself is very odd.

What the table tells us – the clubs

Arsenal have shown how it is possible to make a major change to the number of cards a club gets in a season, dropping from 86 in 2019/20 down to 47 the following season.

Chelsea are currently heading for a very low number of yellows this year, having worked their way down slowly, season by season.

Liverpool, year after year, record the lowest number of yellow cards.  No matter how they change their defence, referees are just reluctant to hand Liverpool players cards.  It is possibly the ultimate self-perpetuating myth – Liverpool players are not dirty, so if a tackle goes in, Liverpool always gets the benefit of the doubt.

Manchester City jump around in terms of yellow cards, ranging from 44 in one season to 71.

Manchester United do tend toward the upper end of the yellow card range, and it is a measure of the problems they are in this season that at current levels of activity they will get the highest number of yellow cards of the big six.

Tottenham, perhaps because of their constant change of management jump here and there without any discernible pattern.

So what is driving this season’s escalation in yellow cards?

The answer to that is fairly simple, for there is a group of clubs charging away at the top of the yellow card table for this season, picking up cards like theys are going be in short supply and they need to get in quick…

Pos	Club	Cards now	Cards est end of season
1.	Newcastle United	30	103
2.	Brighton and Hove Albion	29	100
3.	Burnley	26	90
4.	Aston Villa	25	86
5.	Manchester United	25	86
6.	Leeds United	24	83
7.	Watford	24	83

The nearest we have seen to this, during this century, is Sunderland who got 94 in 2014/15 and Derby County with 93 in 1999/2000.  Few other clubs have even come close.

The curious hidden detail.

So it looks like we are heading for an all-time record season in terms of yellow cards – and that might be because of new instructions to referees on what a yellow card offence constitutes.  Which would be ok, were it not for the fact that Liverpool and Chelsea are both estimated to end up with 41 cards.

Liverpool in doing this will maintain their long term level of yellow cards, while Chelsea is estimated to get ten fewer cards in a season when everyone else’s card rate is going up and up.

The three big questions therefore are:

• How on earth do Liverpool manage to get so few yellow cards season after season?
• How on earth are Chelsea reducing their number of cards, when everyone else’s total is going through the roof.
• Why won’t any of the media tackle this issue?