A Look Into Referee Favoritism
By: Inara | September 28th, 2008In light of the recent accusations that Lyon get favored by arbitration and the brouhaha over video replays, I thought I would post the results of an in depth investigation by Nice Matin, who took a look at every single error in every single Ligue 1 match in the 2007/2008 season.
The results were shocking though not exactly what I had imagined.
Lyon’s controversial penalty against Nice.
It turns out that 157 blatant, obvious, and unarguable mistakes were committed by French referees last season. That is a lot of deserved penalties not whistled - or conversely, undeserved penalties whistled - offside goals allowed, valid goals disallowed, free kicks handed out, etc, for a league that is desperate to make the leap to join the Big 3 (then again, English and Italian refs are hardly better). Still, the fact remains that French arbitration could be a lot better. And let’s not forget that not a single French referee was invited to participate in Euro 2008.
More troubling was that of the 380 games played last season, 64 of them would have had a different outcome if it weren’t for one of those blatant mistakes. It’s pretty obvious that the end of the year standings would have been different, and it’s possible that both the European and relegation spots could have been comprised of different teams.
But the study also struck down some assumptions, such as refereeing errors even out in the end and that big teams are always favored by arbitration.
In the first case, it was discovered that errors evened out in the end for only three clubs - Lyon, Marseille, and Caen. They profited from as many positive mistakes in refereeing as negative ones. But that is not the case for the other 17 clubs in the league, who had some sort of net gain or loss due to arbitration errors.
The second assumption, that big clubs are favored the most, also turned out to be incorrect. The two French heavyweights, Lyon and Marseille, didn’t gain or lose at the end of the year. This is huge because as readers of this blog will know, there is a widespread belief that Lyon are favored by referees more than any other club.
Interestingly, the club who got the most “help” from arbitration mistakes was Nancy, who profited from twelve favorable mistakes versus six unfavorable ones. That’s huge because Nancy were a hairsbreadth from a Champions League spot last season, having fallen two points short of third placed Marseille. Nancy ended up in fourth place in a UEFA Cup spot, however.
Conversely, the club that suffered the most from referring mistakes was Monaco, one of the bigger clubs in France. With only 7 favorable mistakes, Nice Matin found that Monaco also had 17 unfair calls that went against them. This is also a big deal because Monaco did poorly last season and were almost relegated, which in turn hurt the club’s finances. One has to wonder that if it hadn’t been for those mistakes, Monaco might have snagged a European spot.
Just some food for thought for the next time the media starts crying about conspiracies in French football…
Category: Team News and Rumors
Tags: Arbitration, Caen, Lyon, Marseille, Mistakes, Monaco, Nancy, Nice Matin, Refereeing, Referees, Team News and RumorsSubscribe
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Comments
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Very interesting study indeed… And a powerful case for video refereeing in my opinion, which we were discussing in an earlier tread a couple of days ago..
Posted from
United States
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Very interesting there.
I knew Lyon wasn’t favored that much by referee mistake but to have someone clearly prove it is another thing.
Keep up the good work.
Posted from
Canada -
I personally think French referees in general are lacking in quality. In the Galatasaray-Steaua Bucresti Champions league match, the Romanians played so rough and yet Duhammel did not penalize them as necessary.
Posted from
United States -
Don’t EVER talk about Duhamel to me… !!
I still didn’t swallow the Coupe de la ligue’s final between Lens and PSG.Interesting Inara. Thanks a lot.
Can you just tell me where Lens is situated in these referee’s mistakes ?Posted from
France -
Extremely interesing Inara. Merci mille fois.
For me, the most interesting thing about the report is that it was commissioned by the president of the Ligue and done by a long-time D1 and FIFA referee; it isn’t the usual tabloid hack job. I’d be highly interested in seeing the entire report (Jo, the Nice Matin article (which is all we have to go on) doesn’t mention Lens).
That said, as one who has at times favoured both the “evening out” and “big team advantage” points of view on this eternal question, I don’t think that anyone who has made those arguments would expect the “evening out” to take place within the course of a single season (or to ever to be mathematically precise). The same goes for the “big club” theory.
It’s also worth pointing out that one of the primary bases for the “big club” theory is crowd pressure and media attention, and while Monaco are surely a “big club” in terms of their finances and palmeres, they are anything but “big” in those two respects.
As to the level of officiating in general, one yearns for the days of Vautrot and Quinou. I had some problems with Quinou when he was active, but compared to the current crop, he was Collina bis.
I also tend to blame Escalettes and the muppets running the FFF for this state of affairs (though to be fair, I blame for them for pretty much everything that is wrong in French football).
Posted from
Italy -
Now Thiriez, president of the “Ligue des Footballeurs Professionnels” is getting loud and clear about the fact that this situation can’t continue, and how he wants to improve the quality of refereeing:
two high speed cameras (25 pics/sec):one in one of the vertical posts, one in the horizontal post, coupled to a computer ( a kind of Hawk Eye, like in tennis).
He says it costs “almost nothing”, has been successfully tested since 2005(0% errors apparently). This solution only focuses on the position of the ball vis-a-vis the line (no replay possible for fouls, etc…).
He namely criticized the conservatism of the ruling institutions of football, represented by Sepp Blatter and Michel Platini, who’d better listen to this, because that is what the European leagues want. For Thiriez, if these top guys kept ignoring that message, they would face the risk of seeing the leagues adopt such a system with or without them.Posted from
Germany -
I think lyon need to start playing ederson in CM instead of the wing considering we purchased him to replace juninhos position.
Posted from
United States -
And here’s Platini’s reply to Thiriez:
“People should understand that it is not Michel Platini who issues the laws of the game, but the International Board. I just express my opinion. Yes, we will kill the referees if we introduce the video. As soon as there is video, there will be no referees. ”
He also confirmed that tests with five referees are scheduled in October and November at -19 y.o. tournaments: “If the test is successful and if the French League wants to ask the Board to put refereeing at 5 in place, I will not object.”Posted from
Germany -
funny. some other Monaco fans regularly complain about the refs, but I myself hadn’t made too much of it…
Posted from
United States
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