Referees' Performances | 2025/26

[bluetonium]

Can't blame him for our defensive farts, but my word if he's one of the best in the game currently then surely the need to overhaul is self evident.

Constantly blocking off city players from receiving the ball, lack of positional awareness only comparable with trump's daily posts on truth social.

Yellow carded beto for intentionally stepping on a city players foot, having just refused to book beto for, yep you guessed it, intentionally stepping on a city player's foot.

Allowed Pickford more than 8 seconds to release the ball on several occasions. Not hard to check this one watching on the telly, with a big timer in the top left hand corner, but seemingly impossible for the official.

Gave a corner that Everton scored a third from, despite it coming off an Everton player.

With regards to the non red card, something I've not seen commented on what the speed that the Everton player came in at. It doesn't matter that it was lower than knee height, it was reckless, out of control, nowhere near he ball, and a potential ankle breaker.

Still, should have won despite the above, and it's our own fault we didn't through a lack of killer instinct and some terrible, terrible defending.

I still don't think though that we should be classing that second Everton goal as a different phase of play, Guehi's options there are limited due to awareness of the player behind him. He just messed up the backpass awfully, but if the player isn't offside he possibly has more time to think and doesn't make the mistake. Or does anyway, who knows.

 

[simundo]

Crikey. Do Folk really see the Doku tackle as a red? Every team gets bad decisions, fact of life for every winner, there is a loser. There is no secret cult of referees out to get us, or anybody else. Lets park that theory next to a flat earth and jesus being an alien. Last night was a result of a season long theme where we lack urgency and dont kill teams off. It is not that we cant play that way, we can and do it very well, its just the players are so tactically obedient that it counts against us occasionally.

 

[mattcity5]

That's eight more points we could have potentially had. At the time it's shrugged off as often there's a lot more games to play but come the end of the season you realise how important and impactful they all proved to be. There was also the Semenyo hair pull which should have been a penalty and a red card too, was it the Brighton game? That's two more points if it was.

The hair pull was Fulham at home, Kenny Tete.

 

[Pingu the Penguin]

Crikey. Do Folk really see the Doku tackle as a red? Every team gets bad decisions, fact of life for every winner, there is a loser. There is no secret cult of referees out to get us, or anybody else. Lets park that theory next to a flat earth and jesus being an alien. Last night was a result of a season long theme where we lack urgency and dont kill teams off. It is not that we cant play that way, we can and do it very well, its just the players are so tactically obedient that it counts against us occasionally.

45 posts in 16 years……

 

[mattcity5]

Oliver was impartial. The problem last night was he was giving us free kicks in the first half quite rightly, because they were kicking lumps out of us. But it was happening so frequently the crowd got on his back and he bottled it, which he’s got a habit of doing.

By the end of the game he wasn’t giving the right decision and let the crowd ref the game. It’s not bias, he started well, he’s just a coward.

Totally agree. I've called him a coward loads of times before and that's exactly what he is. Situations occur and he ends up doing what he thinks will cause him the least grief in the long run.

 

[mattcity5]

Crikey. Do Folk really see the Doku tackle as a red? Every team gets bad decisions, fact of life for every winner, there is a loser. There is no secret cult of referees out to get us, or anybody else. Lets park that theory next to a flat earth and jesus being an alien. Last night was a result of a season long theme where we lack urgency and dont kill teams off. It is not that we cant play that way, we can and do it very well, its just the players are so tactically obedient that it counts against us occasionally.

And this kind of reaction is exactly why England would be the best place to attempt match-fixing.

If the decisions we've had against us in the last few years happened in Italy there would already have been proper investigations. Over here? Nah, it's not possible...

 

[waspish]

Next manager won’t be as calm as Pep with the amount of decisions goes against us!

 

[Ban-jani]

Totally agree. I've called him a coward loads of times before and that's exactly what he is. Situations occur and he ends up doing what he thinks will cause him the least grief in the long run.

He’s bottled big decisions in big games fairly regularly too. It’s Oliver’s issue. He is a very good referee right up until the crowd get on his case or he has to make a game defining decision in a big fixture, then he goes to pieces.

 

[Dave Ewing's Back 'eader]

Sorry can't agree, if the players can put that urgency & pass the ball that much quicker in the last 15 mins of the game they can do it from minute 1. Doesn't take a robot to pass the ball quicker instead of farting about taking 3 or 4 touches, these are elite athletes that train week in week out! It's ok to disagree, and if you think that result tonight was down to refereeing decisions & not our complacency then im afraid I'll have to disagree with you.

Not wholly, but they are in there every fuckin' game manipulating the written LotG. They know it, the watching fans know it, Teams are not reffed the same way. You can see where refs will think 'Oh, it's only Burnley, Wolves, Forest! Nobody's gonna bother about a yellow when it should be red, and we've got VAR and Howie to back us up!' it's rotten to the core. Decisions made and taken that are totally contrary to what I saw a week ago, indeed, what I saw in the first half.

 

[paulchapo]

Crikey. Do Folk really see the Doku tackle as a red? Every team gets bad decisions, fact of life for every winner, there is a loser. There is no secret cult of referees out to get us, or anybody else. Lets park that theory next to a flat earth and jesus being an alien. Last night was a result of a season long theme where we lack urgency and dont kill teams off. It is not that we cant play that way, we can and do it very well, its just the players are so tactically obedient that it counts against us occasionally.

46 posts in 16 years?? We are reffed differently, go to the ref thread, loads of evidence there.

 

[paulchapo]

He’s bottled big decisions in big games fairly regularly too. It’s Oliver’s issue. He is a very good referee right up until the crowd get on his case or he has to make a game defining decision in a big fixture, then he goes to pieces.

I remember a game against the rags at our place when he waved away something like three clear cut penalties but eventually had to give us one as otherwise it was too obvious to hide he was screwing us over.

 

[simundo]

45 posts in 16 years……

And?

 

[ali benarbia's studs]

Next manager won’t be as calm as Pep with the amount of decisions goes against us!

Every team gets a bit of it...... usually top 3 get a little less as the season goes on. You re right though we should have just accept it and our next manager will have to be smart and not over react like Arteta does.

 

[give it to gordon]

I’ve just seen a replay of that challenge on Doku, it was a clear red. Another one missed on him.

Missed ?

 

[give it to gordon]

Crikey. Do Folk really see the Doku tackle as a red? Every team gets bad decisions, fact of life for every winner, there is a loser. There is no secret cult of referees out to get us, or anybody else. Lets park that theory next to a flat earth and jesus being an alien. Last night was a result of a season long theme where we lack urgency and dont kill teams off. It is not that we cant play that way, we can and do it very well, its just the players are so tactically obedient that it counts against us occasionally.

Newcastle 2 missed red cards
Rags one missed red card
Arsenal one missed red card
Everton one missed red car
Very dodgy off side twice with Newcastle. Remember the 8 minutes it took to five Haaland off side ?

I think you can guess i disagree with you .

Last night the crowd ended up reffing the game !

 

[Gordyola]

Oliver was impartial. The problem last night was he was giving us free kicks in the first half quite rightly, because they were kicking lumps out of us. But it was happening so frequently the crowd got on his back and he bottled it, which he’s got a habit of doing.

By the end of the game he wasn’t giving the right decision and let the crowd ref the game. It’s not bias, he started well, he’s just a coward.

Disagree from minute one he was siding towards them as the agenda seems to be to allow the game to flow by not giving FKs he allowed the over the top aggression that encouraged them to pump it up even more This seems to be the mantra for all our games now, we dont get FKs but opposition get soft ones

 

[Ban-jani]

I remember a game against the rags at our place when he waved away something like three clear cut penalties but eventually had to give us one as otherwise it was too obvious to hide he was screwing us over.

The derby is what I had in mind, mate. He is a coward when it comes to the big calls.

 

[Ban-jani]

Disagree from minute one he was siding towards them as the agenda seems to be to allow the game to flow by not giving FKs he allowed the over the top aggression that encouraged them to pump it up even more This seems to be the mantra for all our games now, we dont get FKs but opposition get soft ones

Agree to disagree. I thought first half he was pretty good, he was giving us the correct calls but as time went on he got worse and worse.

 

[alexmcity]

The foul on Doku doesn't look like a red card if shown in slow motion. Because the latter masks the excessive force.

This decision might cost us the league, because it might be the difference between drawing 3:3 and winning 3:0... Or that Solanke goal, or many other decisions. Can understand if Pep feels tired by that treatment.

 

[Saddleworth2]

45 posts in 16 years……

and now one in defence of last nights refereeing performance. Crikey indeed.