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Every game we seem to come away from games conceding more free kicks than our opposition. What's your theory as to why it occurs? Is it because the refs are against us? Or is it purely a result of our pressing game? The freekicks that we do give away tend to be in midfield. We don't give away too many in scoring positions. ie, they don't hurt us when we concede. So do you think it's a tactic to be physical and "rough up" the opposition as well as slowing the play down when we don't have the ball? Or are the refs just against us?

I think it's just dodgy.

When players fall over against us, it seems they often get kicks for minimal contact but similar incidents at the other end are waved play on. Whether it's refs trying to go out of their way not to favour our star players & going too far the other way I don't know but it seems to be out of proportion.

The earlier game v Wolves & last season's game at Goodison are two of the worst examples I've ever seen.

Ted Hughes wrote:I think it's just dodgy.

When players fall over against us, it seems they often get kicks for minimal contact but similar incidents at the other end are waved play on. Whether it's refs trying to go out of their way not to favour our star players & going too far the other way I don't know but it seems to be out of proportion.

The earlier game v Wolves & last season's game at Goodison are two of the worst examples I've ever seen.

I think Stoke was the game where I started to wonder about this.

It is almost impossible to have 70% posession and commit more fouls than the opposition, but somehow we manage it. Regardless of the pressing game, a pressing game tends to cause misplaced passes from the opposition rather than more tackles from us - and i'm pretty certain if someone dug out the opta stats would bear this out.

Some of the shit that has gone on in games this season have been farcical regarding the foul statistics, so given it has happened under a number of referees you would have to think that it is something about our game which is responsible.

There is of course another potential explanation, but that would require a significant conspiracy to involve so many refs

Simples - #Together we tackle harder

http://www.mcfc.co.uk/citytv/Features/2012/March/Together-we-tackle-harder

Seriously though, for Roberto it's all about the shape of the team so I wouldn't be surprised if it is partly his instructions too that we stop their attacks in midfield before they get to dangerous areas.

Moonchesteri wrote:Seriously though, for Roberto it's all about the shape of the team so I wouldn't be surprised if it is partly his instructions too that we stop their attacks in midfield before they get to dangerous areas.

They're not all in midfield though. That doesn't explain why Everton got a free kick ever time Vinny or JL challenged for a header at Goodison last season or why Aguero being pushed in the back is different to Fletcher being pushed in the back during the Wolves game.

A side containing Carl Henry, has twice got 100% more free kicks than us whilst getting comfortably beat. I don't believe refs have a pro Wolves bias, or that we are so much dirtier as a team so something else is going on imo.

I think although we are not a dirty team we are a team full of players who don't take any shit and if anything give back a little harder than anything they may recieve.For me having players like NDJ,Gareth ,Vinceent,Zabba Yaya even little David IMO gives it leads to us giving away a lot of free kicks.

We are clearly the rough-houses of the premier league, much more so than proper cultured football teams like Wolves, QPR, everton, Norwich and Bolton.

Barry and Y.Toure are very adept at giving away freekicks on purpose, this is usually by stopping the oppositions flow and allowing us to re-group. Most of barrys freekicks are not because of a mistimed tackle, in fact as far as he was concerned it was timed perfectly to prevent the danger and allowing us to get back and cover. Plus Barry is the best opne on the team at Buying freekicks, he is the best I have seen do this since we had Bosvelt, who was a master at it and so was Didi Hamann.

Wonderwall wrote:Barry and Y.Toure are very adept at giving away freekicks on purpose, this is usually by stopping the oppositions flow and allowing us to re-group. Most of barrys freekicks are not because of a mistimed tackle, in fact as far as he was concerned it was timed perfectly to prevent the danger and allowing us to get back and cover. Plus Barry is the best opne on the team at Buying freekicks, he is the best I have seen do this since we had Bosvelt, who was a master at it and so was Didi Hamann.

Spot on.

Also, whoever mentioned that its as a result of the pressing we do is correct, we give a fair few fouls away here. Im sure we'll get better at this aspect of pressing the more we do it.

For all the conspiricies we have against us, this is the flimsiest!

just checked the stats. no surprise that barry leads the team with 45 fouls committed in the PL this season. but guess who's second? balotelli with only 2 fewer at 43!!! joke.

Wonderwall wrote:Barry and Y.Toure are very adept at giving away freekicks on purpose, this is usually by stopping the oppositions flow and allowing us to re-group. Most of barrys freekicks are not because of a mistimed tackle, in fact as far as he was concerned it was timed perfectly to prevent the danger and allowing us to get back and cover. Plus Barry is the best opne on the team at Buying freekicks, he is the best I have seen do this since we had Bosvelt, who was a master at it and so was Didi Hamann.

It's exactly this, there were 4 or 5 times yesterday where Barry was close to a foul without looking like he intended it, ghosting behind the legs of a running opposition player in the hope that slight incidental contact would cause them to fall without necessarily conceding a foul at all.

And Wolves, Stoke etc aren't clever enough to do this ?

They just play it straight and clean, & so they only give half the fouls away that we do ? Really ?

Players were doing that in the 1960's. It's hardly rocket science and doesn't explain why we get pulled up for it rather than the oppo.

Fatty Barry should stop fuckign running into people....one thing we cannot afford to do is give away free kicks anywhere near our penalty area otherwise Thriller will stick it in the net.

Does my fucking coconut in when I see Barry tumble into a player..I swear he has fuckall balance that lad....Infact fuck it..I dont even want him playing against the Munchens.

Arsenal fan's blow by blow detailed dissection of Foy's performance v Norwich.

When you consider we won this game six one, I recon this is damning evidence of exactly what some of us have been saying about the percentage of dodgy calls. I recon if you dissected every game like this, going through details rather than the rag's typical "well we should have had a pen 2nd half" random method, you will find this kind of thing happening over and over again. Notice how few of the incidents involve Barry or Toure which some are suggesting are the reason for our often disproportionate ratio of free kicks.


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