Untold Ref Review: Stoke 2 – Tottenham 1; one of the worst ref performances all season « Untold Arsenal: Arsenal News. Supporting the Lord Wenger; coach of the decade

By Ref Reviewer 03

For the game between Stoke and Tottenham we had ref Chris Foy coming out of his bed. How did he do this game?

Min	Type	Foul from	On	C/NC	Comment	points	weight
5	OTHER	Shotton	Bale	NC	Shove/Trip – not given	0	0
7	OFFSIDE	Adebayor		C	Assumed correct	1	1
8	OTHER			NC	Throw-in wrongly given to Stoke, ball last off Woodgate	0	0
10	OTHER	Walters	Walker	C	Looked a fair challenge but without a replay, I’ll give ref benefit of doubt	1	1
11	OTHER			C	Van der Vaart’s corner curled out for goal kick	1	1
13	OTHER	Crouch	Friedel	NC	Used arm to hold off keeper – not given	0	0
13	OTHER	Crouch		NC	Controlled ball with arm – not given	0	0
13	GOAL			NC	Irregular goal awarded – crouch handled in the build up then assisted to Etherington	0	0
15	OTHER	Walters	Parker	NC	Push – not given	0	0
16	OTHER	Gallas	Crouch	C	Trip	1	1
17	OTHER	Whelan	Parker	C	Trip	1	1
21	OTHER	Assou-Ekotto	Whitehead	NC	Led with forearm/elbow to win header	0	0
21	RED	Assou-Ekotto	NC	This was violent play – should have been sent off	0	0
24	OTHER	Van der Vaart	C	Handball	1	1
25	OTHER	Bale	Whitehead	C	Kicked ball and player	1	1
29	OTHER	Woodgate	Lennon	C	Trip	1	1
29	YELLOW	Woodgate		C	Unsporting behaviour	1	2
34	OFFSIDE	Adebayor		C	Assumed correct	1	1
34	OTHER	Crouch	Parker	C	Trip	1	1
35	OTHER	Walters	Assou-Ekotto	C	Trip	1	1
38	OTHER	Shotton	Assou-Ekotto	NC	Pulled him back – not given	0	0
43	GOAL			C	Etherington – goal okay	1	3
	Half time					13	16
			CORRECT		59,09%	55,17%
	YELLOW				1	1	100,00
	RED				0	1	0,00
	PENALTY			0	0
	GOAL				1	2	50,00
	OTHER				1	3	33,33
					3	7	42,86
	OFFSIDE				2	2	100,00
	Second half
47	OTHER	Whitehead	Parker	C	Foul	1	1
53	OTHER	Etherington	Van der Vaart	C	Pull	1	1
55	OTHER	Crouch	Adebayor	NC	Climbed on him – not given	0	0
58	OTHER	Kaboul	Walters	NC	Trip – not given	0	0
61	PENALTY	Whelan	Modric	NC	Blatant dive by Modric – ref got it wrong	0	0
61	YELLOW	Modric		NC	Should have been booked for diving	0	0
62	GOAL			NC	Adebayor scored from a wrongly awarded spot kick	0	0
63	OFFSIDE	Adebayor		C		1	1
66	PENALTY	Shawcross	Kaboul	NC	Held his arm preventing him from playing ball – not given	0	0
66	YELLOW	Shawcross		NC	Should have been booked for unsporting behaviour	0	0
66	YELLOW	Kaboul		C	Dissent	1	2
68	OTHER	Van der Vaart	Whitehead	C	Shove	1	1
70	OTHER			NC	Goal kick wrongly given to Stoke instead of corner	0	0
72	OTHER	Walker		NC	Stole 10 yards on throw-in	0	0
74	PENALTY	Shawcross	Gallas	NC	Pulled his arm back to stop him playing ball in front of net	0	0
74	RED	Shawcross		NC	Denying an obvious goalscoring opportunity – not given	0	0
74	PENALTY	Shawcross		NC	Blocked shot off the line with elbow	0	0
74	OFFSIDE	Adebayor		NC	Was played on by Wilson	0	0
74	GOAL			NC	Adebayor’s goal wrongly ruled out for offside	0	0
77	PENALTY		C	Crouch fell but Bassong had position – good no-call	1	3
78	PENALTY		C	Ball hit Whitehead’s arm unintentionally – good no-call	1	3
79	OTHER	Adebayor	Woodgate	C	Shove	1	1
81	YELLOW	Wilson		C	Time-wasting	1	2
82	OTHER	Kaboul	Walters	C	Bumped into him	1	1
82	YELLOW/RED	Kaboul		NC	Walters was going away from goal and went down easily – not worth 2nd yellow	0	0
86	OTHER	Adebayor	Shawcross	C	Used raised arm to win header	1	1
90+2	OTHER	Parker	Crouch	C	Tripped from behind	1	1
90+2	YELLOW	Parker		C	Deserved	1	2
90+3	OTHER	Whelan	Modric	NC	Won the ball fairly	0	0
90+4	OTHER	Giovanni	Whitehead	NC	Trip – not given	0	0
90+4	OTHER	Giovanni		C	Improper throw-in	1	1
90+5	OTHER	Bale	Palacios	C	Late lunging tackle – advantage played	1	1
			2nd half score
	TOTAL					15	22
	%		CORRECT		46,88%	39,29%
	YELLOW				3	6	50,00
	RED				0	1	0,00
	PENALTY			2	6	33,33
	GOAL				0	2	0,00
	OTHER				1	1	100,00
					6	16	37,50
	OFFSIDE				0	1	0,00
			TOTAL SCORE
	TOTAL					28	38
	%		CORRECT		51,85%	44,71%
	YELLOW				4	7	57,14
	RED				0	2	0,00
	PENALTY			2	6	33,33
	GOAL				1	4	25,00
	OTHER				2	1	200,00
					9	23	39,13
	OFFSIDE				2	3	66,67
	Correct calls	For Stoke	19	67,86%
			For Tottenham	9	32,14%
			Total correct calls	28
	Wrong calls	Against Stoke	9	34,62%
			Against Tottenham	17	65,38%
			Total		26
	Total fouls made by	Stoke		16	59,26%
			Tottenham	11	40,74%
			Total		27

it was probably a day he probably wishes he had stayed in bed. This is one of the worst performances by a ref I have seen this season. Not only did he score an extremely low 52% on the day, he missed several important calls such as only getting 1 of 4 goal decisions correct.

The majority of the wrong decisions went against Tottenham although they were lucky that Assou-Ekotto wasn’t sent off in the first half for leading with his forearm when running in for a header, catching Dean Whitehead square in the face.

Tottenham can feel aggrieved that Stoke opened the scoring after Peter Crouch used his arm to control a ball into the area before squaring the ball back for Matthew Etherington to slot home from close range. That was the first goal that shouldn’t have counted and it wouldn’t be the last.

In the 61st minute, Modric dribbled the ball into the area when Glenn Whelan stuck his foot out and then quickly pulled back. It looked like Whelan didn’t touch Modric but the Croatian took a couple of steps and shamelessly threw himself to ground. Surely it should have been a booking for simulation but Chris Foy instead awarded the spot kick to Tottenham which Adebayor calmly put away to get a goal back for the Spurs though it shouldn’t have counted.

In the 66th minute Kaboul was furious when someone had apparently forgot to tell Shawcross that this is not rugby for the Stoke defender blatantly took strong hold of Kaboul’s arm preventing him from heading the ball from a corner kick into the area. Perhaps Foy was second guessing himself after awarding Modric a dodgy penalty and from then on you couldn’t buy a penalty. But it was a clear penalty nonetheless and Shawcross also escaped a booking for his part.

The 74th minute was arguably the most controversial in the match. In the space of 10 seconds Tottenham lost 2 penalty appeals and had a perfectly good goal disallowed.

Modric’s cross into the area was spilled by Sorensen and Gallas was there to tap in. However Shawcross had hooked the ex-Arsenal defender’s arm, pulling him back and preventing him from playing the ball. This was from 3 yards out with the goal at his mercy. It should have been a penalty and a red card for Shawcross.

Then Shawcross had enough time to get back on his line to clear Kaboul’s follow-up shot off the line using his elbow. Sometimes this is hard to see for a ref or a linesman, but the ball was saved unfairly and it should have been a spot kick.

And finally after the ball came back out after Shawcross had cleared it with his elbow it was played back in to Adebayor who slotted home past Sorensen. However the linesman incorrectly ruled him for being offside because Stoke defender Marc Wilson was late getting back upfield and played Adebayor onside by a good 2 yards.

Tottenham’s chances of salvaging a point from the contest were later damaged by the 82nd minute sending off of defender Younes Kaboul who had been previously booked for dissent. Walters who had a hint of offside from his run was caught in the thigh by Kaboul’s knee. Walters dropped to his knees under what seemed to be slight contact and appealed to the ref who then sent off Kaboul for his second yellow. A foul it was but not a booking in my opinion and it was very harsh to send someone off for a somewhat innocuous challenge especially as Walters looked like he was heading more towards the corner flag than the goal.

So overall it was an absolute shocker for Chris Foy. Wrong decisions favoured Stoke by nearly 2:1 and he only got 1 out of 3 calls right for Spurs.

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