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http://www.football.com/en-us/community/netherlands/curtain-calls-09-Jul-2014/
http://www.football.com/en-us/community/football/dive-prevention-06-Jul-2014/
http://gsofootball.com/blog/2014/07/07/scolari-paint-us-a-picture/
http://workroom101.com
Yellow Fever: A Look at Cards in European Matches
http://gsofootball.com/2014/05/yellow-fever-a-look-at-cards-in-european-matches/#text
By Danny Odum
29 May 2014
You hear it and think it all the time, “the ref really missed that one,” “that call changed the game,” or “that’s a lot of cards.” It lasts for the moment. It makes good conversation over a pint of beer, or gives commentators something to fill the last five minutes of a show. In the next few paragraphs we will attempt to look just a little bit further into the controversy and perhaps avoid shouts of conspiracy. Every sport with officiating potentially has the issue. Soccer, however, is a game of fluidity. The referee and the four outside lines are the only things that really interrupt the flow for the 90 minutes. Have teams from certain leagues suffered from over-officious referees in UEFA matches?
To delve into this subjective subject, a look at the objective facts is crucial.worldreferee.com provides us some great basic metrics. The site ranks referees by how unobtrusive they are while keeping the game in check. Fan opinion and a panel of knowledgable soccer folk rank the referee performances. For example, Milorad Mazic was ranked number one for the season just ending. In 61 matches he booked very similarly for home and away teams. Mazic owns two of the five top rated matches of the year. In fairness, he also was on the whistle for one of the worst games of they year, PSG vs Chelsea. Even good refs have bad games, it seems. In those cases, it may be player behavior, a bad night’s sleep, or lunar cycles that prevail. But that was one game of 61. You get the idea.
Mr. Howard Webb is another respected fixture on the international scene. His overall stats for penalties, red cards, and yellows run eerily similar to Mazic’s. On average, after looking at all the better refs and leagues, home teams draw a bit fewer than 2 yellows per game. The away team stacks up half a yellow card more per match. Webb keeps this average while primarily working in the Premier League. This is important. It demonstrates that across leagues, referees function similarly and that players behavior is about the same regardless of league. We will look at yellow card bookings after the group stages in UEFA tournaments as a standard.
Is this the mythical home field advantage of lore we see? Home teams get half a yellow card less than away teams. It could be due to nerves, unfamiliar environs, hostile fan interactions, or other factors. This trend spans the game at the highest levels, regardless of other factors. It’s a great starting point for a real conversation. Managers should know this, and most likely do.
UEFA Champions League matches this year often drew disdain from fans, managers, and commentators alike. Some threw around charges that Premier League teams were targeted. It did seem a bit strange that out of the 16 finalists, all four Premier teams were alive, but none lived to see the final. Only Chelsea limped into the semis. However, the numbers lead in a slightly different direction, away from conspiracy and toward an understanding of how teams handle play under the heavy yellow card conditions which should be expected in a tournament.
Chelsea, for example, drew 17 yellows in the final stages of the tournament vs 16 for opponents. That’s an average of around 2.83 yellows for Chelsea, higher than Chelsea’s season average by nearly a card per game. But, it seems fairly even, 17 vs 16. That is nearly a yellow card more than our baseline, also. To determine whether Chelsea was hurt, let’s look at their season average of 1.98 yellows away and 1.59 at home. Now we can say that Chelsea may well have been affected by the yellows, especially considering that Chelsea’s opponents play with more yellow cards in every match. Chelsea could have simply had difficulty overcoming the pressure of playing under more caution. The message is play teams like Chelsea hard, take the yellows, and they will cave.
Bayern Munich averaged just 1.33 yellows in their final 8 matches of UEFA Champions League play. That is substantially lower than the average, even lower than their season average of 1.68 yellows per home match. Real Madrid averaged 2.25 over the last 8, and still won the title. But Real Madrid averages nearly 2.5 yellows on the road anyway. They became accustomed to playing under the pressure of yellow cards. Real’s opponents averaged 2.25, and that could imply that they are controlling the tone of matches.
In fairness, it appears that all play in Champions League matches was slightly more contentious than league play around the same time period. More yellows were shown by nearly all refs. The four Premier League teams inspired the officials to pull their cards more often, but so did their opponents in those particular matches. Bayern Munich was an exception, but their relaxed style of play didn’t provide the desired results either, as they were blown out by Real Madrid.
Bundesliga teams drew about 1.5 yellows. Spanish teams averaged around 2 yellows per game, when the jaundiced final is taken out of consideration (it was two Spanish teams and a sheer anomaly, so it should be eliminated for comparison anyway). Does this all mean anything. Well, yes it could. Remember our baseline of just below and just of above 2 yellows for home/away? The one takeaway is that yellow cards created an “away effect” for Premier League teams in the final stages of UEFA Champions play. In fact, the “effect” affected those teams a little beyond the baseline home/away figures to be expected. English teams were playing slightly uphill even when playing at home. In relation to some teams, there was nearly a full card’s difference on average. Considering that the game is so diverse regarding player distribution, that seems to be a real effect.
In some ways, the charges of bias look supported. The reasoning behind those calls will remain unknown. A reasonable mind can take away two things. Premier League teams gathered more yellows this year across UEFA play (even at the junior level). It may have provided an artificial home advantage to some of their opponents. Chelsea seems to typify this phenomenon. They did not respond well to yellow cards and other circumstances in both UEFA and Premier League play.
However, to win a trophy, a team must adjust, and play as if under duress all the time. Real Madrid and Atletico demonstrated how important this is in the final. Home field advantage should and does exist in soccer. It always will. If you can play like you are away all the time, you can reduce the influence officials can exert upon the game. This is important for every team to remember in the upcoming World Cup: Everyone, except one team, is away. Play like you’re away, and don’t give any more advantage away when hit with your expected 2 yellow cards per game.
Brazuca - It Rhymes with Bazooka
Well, for those of you staying up late, worrying about the new ball design that will be in play for the entire 2014 World Cup, worry no more! The German uber-magazine. “Der Spiegel” reports the findings of a Japanese wind tunnel study [those guys are working together again?] ( http://www.spiegel.de/wissenschaft/technik/wm-ball-brazuca-versuche-im-windkanal-zeigen-stabile-flugbahn-a-972399.html#ref=rss) done on the the new sphere. In the article, the ball is reported to be neutral and stable regarding flight characteristics. This is a departure from the previous official balls due to better construction and consistency seen in the samples tested.
As only they could, the Japanese mustered the pinnacle of robotic technology to conduct the testing. The testing involved a specially designed robotic foot/striker, a large sample of balls, and numerous windy conditions. Each ball was tested primarily at 25 meters with strikes to all sections of the ball, to fully sample the wind’s input upon the ball. The unique panels seem to provide the desired effect.
Some may remember the 1994 ball controversies. That particular ball (of eerily similar design) was described as neutral and under-stable. In the real world, resulting ball flights could take wild arcs not easily predicted by the shooter or the goalie. In 1994, many felt the crossbar and side posts were struck too often. The South Korea vs Germany preliminary comes to mind. This seems to make sense, as strikers attempt to move the ball away from the keeper who is usually near the middle of the goal mouth. Strikers rely on “sending” the ball outward. Some felt it negatively affected scoring. The new ball, however, should take the striker’s intended rotational path and continue in that general direction. In short, the striker can place english on the ball and a goalie should have a fair chances of predicting the ball path. That sounds pretty fair.
Quick footed, direct shooters like Arjen Robben and Christian Ronaldo will be happy. Looping, outside shooters like Yaya Toure will be happy (as long as his birthday is properly acknowledged). Pin-pointers and loopers alike should be able to target a sector of the goal and feel confident that if they can direct it there, it will go there. The ball has been declared “the best” by Der Spiegel. The test seem to confirm the design and construction. Now we just need to see how many times the Brazuca blasts home this World Cup. Now get some sleep, the ball is fine.