"It evens itself out over the season"

[Westwood52]

Nothing hacks me off more than the standard of officiating-I can put up with almost anything else in Football except for these prats in black(or green, or yellow).
You sometimes wonder if they go down the Pub and pick the most inebriated drinkers there to ref and run the line.
You think that when you get to the Prem you will get the best-but that is not necessarily the case-I have seen the odd good ref in the lower leagues who never gets to the Prem why ? Is it politics-brown nosing their way to the top ? TBF I have never seen a biased ref-except in so far as the really big teams get the decisions in their favour.
I feel the FA needs to change how the Officials move up through the system-they need to put more emphasis on perception and decision making, rather than just having a big ego. Fitness and knowledge of the laws are just a given.

[soggy biscuit]

Nothing hacks me off more than the standard of officiating-I can put up with almost anything else in Football except for these prats in black(or green, or yellow).
You sometimes wonder if they go down the Pub and pick the most inebriated drinkers there to ref and run the line.
You think that when you get to the Prem you will get the best-but that is not necessarily the case-I have seen the odd good ref in the lower leagues who never gets to the Prem why ? Is it politics-brown nosing their way to the top ? TBF I have never seen a biased ref-except in so far as the really big teams get the decisions in their favour.
I feel the FA needs to change how the Officials move up through the system-they need to put more emphasis on perception and decision making, rather than just having a big ego. Fitness and knowledge of the laws are just a given.

You are aware of how officials are scored, their league table and the process involved I take it?

They are not just blokes who can answer questions a few questions correctly.

[Ian Royal]

West ham back pass that pog scored?
Villa own goal?

I would say though that weve had more against than for this season, I mean how lucky was that goal for united yesterday and then for wigan to grab that ridiculously lucky winner. We would have got a point, such is life. Another nail in the coffin.

El Habsi's hilarious howler.

[mr_number]

Tbh it was this sort of moaning about injustice that put me off McDermott this season. In post-match interviews he would often point to blatant injustice (when in reality most were debatable ref. decisions), rather than address the fact that we had under performed and been outplayed.

Personally, I think publically saying 'we were rubbish' game after game would have been a pretty rubbish response to those questions. It's what he says in private to the players that matters. I'm not sure what benefit you expect to come from saying that we'd been outplayed game after game?

[SydenhamRoyal]

Nothing hacks me off more than the standard of officiating-I can put up with almost anything else in Football except for these prats in black(or green, or yellow).
You sometimes wonder if they go down the Pub and pick the most inebriated drinkers there to ref and run the line.
You think that when you get to the Prem you will get the best-but that is not necessarily the case-I have seen the odd good ref in the lower leagues who never gets to the Prem why ? Is it politics-brown nosing their way to the top ? TBF I have never seen a biased ref-except in so far as the really big teams get the decisions in their favour.
I feel the FA needs to change how the Officials move up through the system-they need to put more emphasis on perception and decision making, rather than just having a big ego. Fitness and knowledge of the laws are just a given.

You are aware of how officials are scored, their league table and the process involved I take it?

They are not just blokes who can answer questions a few questions correctly.

Having a big ego was removed from the list of requirements to get to the top of refereeing in 1867. He's only 156 years behind the times.

[West Stand Man]

Nothing hacks me off more than the standard of officiating-I can put up with almost anything else in Football except for these prats in black(or green, or yellow).
You sometimes wonder if they go down the Pub and pick the most inebriated drinkers there to ref and run the line.
You think that when you get to the Prem you will get the best-but that is not necessarily the case-I have seen the odd good ref in the lower leagues who never gets to the Prem why ? Is it politics-brown nosing their way to the top ? TBF I have never seen a biased ref-except in so far as the really big teams get the decisions in their favour.
I feel the FA needs to change how the Officials move up through the system-they need to put more emphasis on perception and decision making, rather than just having a big ego. Fitness and knowledge of the laws are just a given.

Have you ever contemplated the thought that maybe it is the referee who understands the laws of the game better than you do?

[Man Friday]

You know how to type but it doesn't mean you're going to write something sensible.

[Man Friday]

When someone as significant as that goes our way we have very little right to complain when things don't.

You use one incident that happened 7 years ago in support of your argument. You've just lost that argument.

[Man Friday]

We earned ourselves a decades worth of wrong decisions after the 'phantom goal'

This. Watford won a goal kick, and we got awarded a goal instead.

This argument really really irks me. Anyone who was at the game saw that the ref more than made up for his mistake in the match alone. Rightly or wrongly, that was one of the most one sided referee performances in favour of Watford, ghost goal aside.

Spot on. We'd have won that game easily otherwise. We were denied a blatant penalty and every 50-50 decision thereafter in that match by stupid boy Pike.
Anyway, it was one decision and one point. How can you say every decision should go against us from that point onwards? What team do you really support?

[Man Friday]

West ham back pass that pog scored?
Villa own goal?

I would say though that weve had more against than for this season, I mean how lucky was that goal for united yesterday and then for wigan to grab that ridiculously lucky winner. We would have got a point, such is life. Another nail in the coffin.

Luck in football evens itself out.

Bias in officials' decisions doesn't. They're heavily weighted in favour of where the money (and power) is.

[Man Friday]

Over time, yes it ‘evens itself out’. But seriously, who cares? You get relegated from this division if you’re not good enough.

...but referees favouring the big clubs in key decisions doesn't help either. Imagine where another 6-10 points would get us. 17th place?

[Rax]

West ham back pass that pog scored?
Villa own goal?

I would say though that weve had more against than for this season, I mean how lucky was that goal for united yesterday and then for wigan to grab that ridiculously lucky winner. We would have got a point, such is life. Another nail in the coffin.

Luck in football evens itself out.

Bias in officials' decisions doesn't. They're heavily weighted in favour of where the money (and power) is.

Spot on - who would you rather upset??

SAF who will crucify you personally and you meet season after season or little old Reading who will toe the line in their "once in every five years" trip to the top flight?

#absolutelydisgraceful

[soggy biscuit]

Over time, yes it ‘evens itself out’. But seriously, who cares? You get relegated from this division if you’re not good enough.

...but referees favouring the big clubs in key decisions doesn't help either. Imagine where another 6-10 points would get us. 17th place?

Stop crying about it and accept we weren't good enough to stay up

[Caversham Royal]

We've been mainly shite....in an even sort of way....over most of the season.

[creative_username_1]

West ham back pass that pog scored?
Villa own goal?

I would say though that weve had more against than for this season, I mean how lucky was that goal for united yesterday and then for wigan to grab that ridiculously lucky winner. We would have got a point, such is life. Another nail in the coffin.

Luck in football evens itself out.

Why should it and over what time period?

[RoyaltyInMyBlood]

Against us

Ba handball vs Newcastle
Torres offside vs Chelsea
Penalty not given vs Utd, Villa
Foul on Shorey vs Man City

Feel free to add for/against

Walker Handball No pen vs Spurs (H)
2 Penalties denied vs West Brom (A)
Tabb Pen vs Wigan (A)
2 Penalties vs Southampton (A)
Tabb Penalty & Handball pen vs Man City (A)
Lukaku offside goal vs West Brom (H)
Le fondre Pen vs Stoke (A)
"Offside" goal against Villa

Evens out my oxf*rd arse.

[bcubed]

West ham back pass that pog scored?
Villa own goal?

I would say though that weve had more against than for this season, I mean how lucky was that goal for united yesterday and then for wigan to grab that ridiculously lucky winner. We would have got a point, such is life. Another nail in the coffin.

Luck in football evens itself out.

Why should it and over what time period?

Can anyone who thinks it evens itself out answer this? I'm curious

[barelylubedcock]

I don't believe that the effects of luck do even themselves out. Better players are better prepared to deal with the variations in bounce or flight and react accordingly. They turn more 50:50 challenges into 60:40, get more half chances into full chances, react to the mistakes of other teams quicker and generally tend to bend the match to their will.

We have fewer better players than the teams around and above us. We appear unluckier, but its really a matter of skill and experience.

[creative_username_1]

I don't believe that the effects of luck do even themselves out. Better players are better prepared to deal with the variations in bounce or flight and react accordingly. They turn more 50:50 challenges into 60:40, get more half chances into full chances, react to the mistakes of other teams quicker and generally tend to bend the match to their will.

We have fewer better players than the teams around and above us. We appear unluckier, but its really a matter of skill and experience.

Agree about better players over time should show better results. How do you assess what is luck and what should be skill. An attacker slips as an attack is forming by the time he has got back up he's late coming to play this gives him an advantage skill/luck etc...I used to think that you could be in complete control of these things but now think it's just too complex a system. (22players, 4 officials, 2 managers) making decisions. fans, the pitch, the weather, nature etc playing their part blah blah....i'm really bad at expressing thoughts in words

I would expect 'football luck' to follow any other random distribution in that i would be surprised if some teams weren't un/luckier than average over a given period of time. Deflections, bobbles, beach-balls, phantom goals, gust of wind etc

[barelylubedcock]

I think its more that better and more experienced players tend not be put off by bad luck events and make the most of good luck events. So you can't really disentangle them neatly. So there is still a luck factor involved, they just control it better.