The refs and Newcastle, Tottenham Hotspur, Manchester United, Manchester City and Arsenal « Untold Arsenal: Arsenal News. Supporting the Lord Wenger; coach of the decade

By Walter Broeckx

Did the big decisions go against Newcastle last season?

As you all should now by now it is important to get the big decisions going in your favour. But it also is important to get the small fouls on the field in your favour.  Because that is the way you can have an influence on the field as a ref without people noticing you. When you blow 3 imaginary penalties you expose yourself to the public as a cheat. So it is not the way to do it.

Did Tottenham get a lot of undeserved yellow cards last season?

Getting undeserved yellow cards can undermine a team in a game. If you are already on a yellow card you can play with some restriction in your game. And that is something that can cost you your natural game and become costly for your team. So refs can influence a game with handing out yellow cards that are not fully deserved. Or they can do it the other way round by not giving yellow cards against your opponents when they fully deserve them. The players of the other team can then subconscious feel that they can get away with some things and go in even dirtier than before. So it is important to give the correct cards in a game.

Surely it is a myth that the refs help Manchester United?

Is it a myth or is it reality? Does Manchester United get a lot of help from the refs at times. Or do they sometimes also have to live with bad decisions? Is there a difference for United when playing at Old Trafford or playing away? It sure would be interesting to see if we can find a difference in how the refs make mistakes in the games when Manchester United is involved.

Did the sheikh from Manchester City also bought the whole PGMOL together with Nasri?

If a sheikh who bought (or could buy) every football player in the world for any fee as they are all for sale for the right plrice. You then could start thinking: what if he would get it in to his head to not just buy the player but also the refs? If he would have bought a few refs would this become visible in their numbers? Or is it visible that Manchester City bought the whole PGMOL? Or did they do nothing of that kind?

Surely it will have evened out for Arsenal at the end of the season?

It must. Because otherwise the pundits will look rather stupid with their mantra.  And don’t we rely on the pundits for their wisdom? So if they are going to remain any credibility they numbers must show that the decisions around Arsenal were balanced at the end of the season.

Questions a fan of those teams might ask themselves at times. But where to find the answer. And not just to those questions but to many more questions when it comes to referees and your favourite football team.

For the answer to those questions you can come to Untold Arsenal in the next days or weeks. Of course we will not be able to give you the smoking gun if there is any. But based on our findings in our referee reviews we will be able to shed a light in to the darkness of the referee world.

Untold Arsenal is an Arsenal supporters blog but we have started a search to find answers to those questions not just for Arsenal games but for as many games as possible for all teams in the EPL.

We have a small team of referees who review as many games as possible each match day. And as a result we have reviewed 40% of all games in the PL last season.

And our reviewers do this by looking at the games from the first till the last second and review each incident that involves the ref. And we have judged each incident and gave points to the refs.

We now have a database of over 7000 decisions in the PL that we can link to the referees and the teams involved.

So why don’t you take a look in the next days and keep your eyes open to see if your  team has been screwed by the refs or did they enjoy an easy ride from the refs?

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