The Untold ref review – Arsenal – Chelsea « Untold Arsenal: Arsenal News, supporting the club, the players and the manager
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By Walter Broeckx, the happy ref.
For the third time we had Clattenburg this year and the last one hardly a month ago. A very bad situation for the ref. In fact it is shameful for the FA to always have to send the same refs over and over again to the same teams in the same season.
But let us just see how he did.
OTHER: Kalou makes a tackle in the first minute. The ref gives the foul but not a card. I can understand him not giving a card but he could have spoken to the player. In fact as a ref you should accept such an incident to stamp your authority on the game. I thought he was a bit mild on not lecturing him to be honest. But he gave the foul so: 1/1.
OTHER/CARD: Terry pulls back Van Persie when there was a chance of Arsenal attack. Clattenburg has a word with Terry. As this was the first lecture he gave it is understandable he didn’t give a card. 1/1 and 1/1
PENALTY: After a free kick Djourou goes down but the ref gives nothing. And I think he was right on this. Both players (Djourou and Terry) were pushing a bit but nothing to give really.
OTHER/OTHER: Cole goes in hard on Walcott but the ref gives no foul. It was a case of Cole hitting Walcott’ leg so it should have been a foul. As he gave nothing Song made a foul on Malouda which the ref gave. One wrong, one good. 0/1 and 1/1
PENALTY: Malouda hits Van Persie on his leg when Robin is on the line of the penalty area. Malouda also is on the line of the penalty area with the leg that he uses to touch Van Persie. It was a foul, it was on the line and the line is part of the penalty area: this was a penalty. 0/1
Let’s tick the boxes in the big circle from left to right: Is there contact? Yes. Is the defender in the penalty area? Yes he is. Is the attacker in the penalty area? Yes he is. The line from the penalty area is part of the penalty area. So 3 times yes = penalty.
OTHER: A quick word of praise for the linesman. They got all their offside decisions spot on and also are doing a good job in helping the ref when they signal fouls. And I even include in this when they give fouls against us. When I can give praise, I will do it. 1/1
OTHER/CARD: Sagna plays the ball to Walcott and Cole has a go at Walcott. The player that tried to stop the pass from Sagna came in late and I think this was going through the refs mind when he gave the card to Cole. In a way Cole got the card for the fact that there were 2 consecutive fouls. A good act from the ref. 1/1 and 1/1
OTHER/OTHER: Theo is blocked and no foul given. Van Persie blocks a player and a fouls is given. A little bit inconsistent ref. 0/1 and 1/1
OTHER/CARD: Van Persie comes in from behind and picks up a deserved yellow card. 1/1 and 1/1
OTHER/CARD: Kalou comes in with an outstretched leg flying high in the air and catches Clichy. The ref gives the foul (did you take notice Mr. Webb?) and the ref gives a yellow card. 1/1 and 1/1
PENALTY/OTHER/GOAL: Cesc tries to run on to the ball from Wilshere and is brought down. The ball comes to the feet of Song who was running the same line as Cesc and Song scores. The ref could have given a penalty and in the replay it was clear to see that he gave the advantage signal when Song got to the ball. So at the end of the day by Song scoring he got the advantage right. But we will never know if he would have given the penalty if Song had not scored. It would be my first question if I would have met him after the game. 1/1, 1/1 and 1/1
And in we go at half time. Bring on the hot coffee, tea or whatever hot drink they have in the Emirates.
OTHER/CARD: A late challenge from Ramires on Wilshere. Foul is given but deserved a yellow card. 1/1 and 0/1.
OTHER/GOAL: Walcott looks to be in an offside position but he was not thanks to the right back who played him on. And even then the pass was given by Essien so it never could have been offside. So another great decision from the linesman and also Cesc was onside when Theo played the ball to him. So a very good goal. 1/1 and 1/1
GOAL: Another great goal this time and well taken. 1/1
And then things suddenly changed.
OTHER/OTHER: Wilshere blocked: no foul/Cesc blocked someone: foul given??? Strange ref. What happened? 0/1 and 1/1
OTHER/GOAL: For the slightest of touches the ref gives a free kick to Chelsea. Okay one can blow a foul but if for the rest of the game you have let some things go then this looked rather strange. But Chelsea score from the resulting free kick. Nothing wrong with the goal itself but what a soft free kick. Certainly if you look at other situations in the game e.g. the not given penalty on Van Persie. 0/1 and 1/1.
OTHER/CARD: Late tackle from Lampard on Song and Lampard gets what he deserves : a yellow card. 1/1 and 1/1
OTHER/CARD: Cesc gets a yellow card for a little pull a Chelsea player. He put a hand on his shoulder. A foul but what a very soft yellow card if you ask me. 1/1 and 0/1
OTHER: Chelsea players don’t foul. Well so it looks in the eyes of the ref for the moment. Only when they make 3 fouls in the same move the ref gives a foul to Arsenal. 0/1
OTHER: Every time a Chelsea player goes down in the same area from where the first goal came the ref gives a free kick to Chelsea. Is this some kind of coincidence???? It sure doesn’t feel that way to me. Every dangerous attack from Chelsea comes from a not given foul from the ref. 0/1
OTHER/OTHER : Ramires catches Cesc on his ankle and the ref let play continue. This was a foul ref. Oh and seconds later he gives Chelsea another free kick and guess what… yes on the same spot from where Drogba scored last year and gave the assist to the Chelsea goal. 0/1 but it was a foul for Chelsea I have to admit so 1/1
GOAL: A Chelsea goal is being disallowed for offside. Another correct decision from the linesman. I didn’t get to see any replay from the linesman position but if I can trust them for the rest of their game this was correct and it looked that way. 1/1
And so the games comes to an end. A lot of things and a lot to count if you ask me. So now let us see how many points he got.
CARDS: 5/7
PENALTY: 1/2
GOAL: 5/5
OTHER: 16/22
Total score: 27/36 (75%)
We all have seen games of two halves in which a team has an excellent game in the first half and then mess up in the second half. I had this feeling from Clattenburg in this game. I think he did rather good in the first half apart from the missed penalty on Van Persie but this can happen. But in the second half when it got to 3-0 he suddenly changed drastically. I had the impression we could do nothing good any more and Chelsea could do nothing wrong. I think it would be interesting to see a statistic on to see how many fouls he gave to us up to then and then how the fouls were given when after we had made it 3-0.
But despite this he still got a good 75% and this still is a good number. He certainly was helped a lot by his excellent assistants who did everything right I felt. So a good team work and this is important also for the ref.
I still think he is one of the better refs in the EPL but I didn’t feel completely satisfied with his game today. Certainly the difference in punishing some pushes was a bit strange. But as we have won we are in a good mood and we can forgive him. But I sure would like to see this changing a bit in the future. He lost a lot of points in the last half hour.
And a total score of 78 % in 3 games doesn’t look bad at all. This shows he can be an excellent ref if he keeps himself focused during the whole 90 minutes.