If there was one inciden where Riley needs to come out and explain exactly what happened, then it was last night's red card shit. Anyone heard a peep out of PGMOL?
I think that refereeing standards are particularly poor at the minute, without a doubt. A myriad of mistakes seems to affect many games and it is somewhat staggering that there is just silence from their governing body. Never a comment just some pithy line about ‘over 96% (or some such number) being right and it’s a very difficult job. Well, get better at it or find other people to do it. Where I do struggle, and I accept I’m in a minority here, is that they are deliberately ‘doing us over’. You’d have to be remarkably competent to do that........Agree, and I thought we played pretty well for the most part, I thought wigan were awful, and about as negative and anti football as it comes.
This thread though should be about our (fucking useless) officials, so back on topic please :-)
Apologies for the statto attack but i've been doing some investigation of results with various refs (I trade football matches on Betfair for some of my income)
It's easy to just react to a joker like Taylor yet again being allowed to hurt us, but is there real basis. The results are ridiculous...
I wont bore you with the full details but I looked at all games that Taylor has refereed including either us or the rags since the start of the 2011 season.
Compared with our overall results in those 6 seasons, when Taylor is in charge our points per game drops by 20% whilst the rags results unsurprisingly improve by 12%.
That's quite a swing immediately, but then I thought about it a bit more and decided to look at only games where the outcome had a maximum of 1 goal in it, the theory being that a dodgy ref will struggle to impact a very one sided game as a general rule (We had him v Watford and Swansea away and scored 10 so he was taken out of the equation.), but a few decisions can swing a tight game.
Over the 6 years since 2011/12, the Taylor effect produced a 25% drop in points against our average in tight games. Surprisingly the bias towards Utd isn't there in these games, so maybe he is wary of showing obvious bias to them, or just instinctively does enough to hurt us in tight games.
I then compared the Taylor stats with a couple of our our nemesis men in black, Pawson and Clattenburg and guess what , their stats matched Taylors.
In tight games with a "neutral" referee City averaged 1.76pts per game over those 6 years (124 matches)
However when the PGMOL three refereed us that plummets to just 1.03 points per game (29 matches)
Initially I thought that they had been given top 6 clashes hence the difference but that is not borne out on closer inspection - the games cover all types of opposition evenly.
For reference I did the same with the rags games and their average points with/without these jokers was virtually unchanged (ie no impact or obvious bias in the numbers)
1.76 pts per game to 1.03 is a MASSIVE difference and is way outside any "statistical variance". For me it simply reflects that with any of Taylor, Pawson or Clattenberk in charge we have been at a monstrous disadvantage. Those numbers simply cannot be easily explained any other way.
I have a rule which says that I dont bet on City games, but if I did, I would be looking very closely at opposing City if either Taylor or Pawson is in charge. That system shows a big profit over the 6 years I looked at - it's tempting just as an Anadin bet to cover the headache when we get screwed over by these jokers.
Really worried about Pawson on sunday now. Arsenal are nearly 5/1......
Praying that the boys are up for this and Eddie is in goal (doubt it)!! We need to smash them to take Pawson out of the equation.
Completely paranoid now...
Going back to that Chelsea game, Halsey was interviewed at City Square a couple of weeks later and although he was entertaining City fans so is bound to show some bias, he was absolutely scathing with regards to Taylor's performance. He talked through what Taylor should have done in pre match preparation (Aguero's and Luiz's previous) and then his scandalous decision not to send Luiz off and by the end of the game said Taylor, due to his own incompetence had totally lost control of the playersIt must also be human nature as a player to look at who is refereeing a game and react to that,. Sergio was a case in point on Tuesday night - given his history with Taylor, it would be natural to be a bit on edge, waiting for him to strike. In a close game, just the thought that Alty might do something could be enough to detract players enough to not be at their best. By the time Delph got sent off, I think our lads including the management team were already brewing about Taylor's performance (no red for the foul on Aguerro, obvious penalty on Bernardo), so when he seemed to change his mind on the Delph tackle, we lost it. The Chelsea game last year was the ultimate example. Yes Kev should have made it 2-0, but after the Luiz incident, players were clearly on edge and ultimately that's what caused the reds at the end of the game. Both red card decisions were correct but my argument is that neither Sergio or Dinho would have lost it without the seed being planted by Taylors earlier actions that something unfair was happening. The natural reaction would be to feel that they were being cheated of a chance to challenge fairly for the title and the net effect was two key players lost for 3 games and any title hopes with it.
On Tuesday we could easily have lost Sergio as well. Yes of course we should be beating Wigan, but that's not really the point. As the numbers show, with Alty or Pawson in charge, there is strong evidence to suggest that we are badly disadvantaged and i'm sure the players know that, to the point now where it only takes one incident to change everything mentally.
Another one I looked at was Lee Mason. Our record in close games with him over the last 6 years reads P6, W2 L3, D1. We have won the last 6 games he's done though. Having said that, two of those were Burnley last season which has to be the worst performance i've seen although we somehow managed to get a win and the Cardiff cup tie. His overall stats with us in tight games are the same as Pawson and Alty though and he's from Bolton....
I use www.transfermarkt.com for referee data if anyone else is interested.
I presume you mean in addition to their salaries, because that's what it looks like with every passing match we play with these clowns in charge.I think that refereeing standards are particularly poor at the minute, without a doubt. A myriad of mistakes seems to affect many games and it is somewhat staggering that there is just silence from their governing body. Never a comment just some pithy line about ‘over 96% (or some such number) being right and it’s a very difficult job. Well, get better at it or find other people to do it. Where I do struggle, and I accept I’m in a minority here, is that they are deliberately ‘doing us over’. You’d have to be remarkably competent to do that........
I think complacency and lack of competition is why they’re not very good. Taylor and the rest are on the list, will get their large wedge every week and there are very few ready to replace them. The number of refs lower down the leagues are getting fewer and fewer mainly because the PL have let players get away with backchat for years and years and it’s seen as the norm.
I’d make every academy player do the refs course and encourage as many ‘failed footballers’ as possible to take it on. I’d pay more to the PL refs as well to make it more attractive and have a defined way to the top. New blood is what is needed and quickly.