Shocking refereeing bias towards Man Utd

At what point were you on the pitch to establish this as fact?

I can hardly imagine little old 5 ft 7 (or so) Mata bullying a referee twice the size of him with the authority to send him off (and more) if need be

It goes in one ear and out the other with you, your totally blind by club tribalism

 

Not a conspiracy, proven fact

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/167564.stm

As beneficiaries of the corruption and favouritism I wouldn't expect you to care though. I'd probably do the same under the cirumstances

 

I love it that you have quoted an old BBC article about Sky back from 1998 as proof of the conspiracy. You know what I almost wavered for a second. There have been articles over the years showing that for example Howard Webb doesn't favour Man Utd and yet the nonsense still keeps on coming from you lot.

 

You obviously have no knowledge of the history of football

 

So, Manchester United - the club you support and are defending are lying to the LONDON STOCK EXCHANGE now are they? This is comedy Gold

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Your right Shwan. Mata needs a life ban to stop other referees being put through his reign of torment that Clattenburg had to endure

Met Police to raid Romans office to find traces of ink to see if it matches that of the letter sent to Frisk

 

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Bullying a ref is a new low? Did I really just read that from a Utd fan?

 

Incredible isn't it?

Jaap Stam, David Beckham, Roy Keane, Gary Neville and Roy Keane would be appalled of that kind of behaviour

 

It's not going back 9 years ago as a long standing Man Utd fan like you should know

 

It didn't influence the game at all.

I see you have elected yourself judge, jury and executioner? Everything thus far is based on rumour and hear-say. I suggest you wait for the people who actually know things to tell you the facts of the situation before you decide the truth of the matter.

 

I did nothing of the sort, as I'm a Spurs fan. Hard to accuse me of bias towards Chelsea, isn't it?
I was merely pointing out that Man Utd and bullying officials seem to go hand in hand, so it was rather ironic that you objected to such behaviour.
You'll be complaining about managers treating members of the press unfairly next.

 

Maybe you missed it, but he booked him. And then he booked him again after Evans fouled him.

 

Kung fu kicked

Couldn't make this ****e up.

David Gill, chief exec of United is also vice chairman of the FA, this for me says it all.

 

This sums it up perfectly The expectation for Utd to win and get the favourable decisions, it is ingrained in the culture. Refs are bucking the trend by making decisions that challenge Utd and Fergie and whether it's subconscious or not, there is bias at work.

 

How could that be reasonably explained ?

 

****ing boring, there's NO conspiracy against you, by you I mean Arsenal, Chelsea, Liverpool etc all these big teams who constantly think of **** AND TEDIOUS jokes about howard webb being a united player. it's not corrupt or any of these things, and this is from a QPR fan, and admittedly I hate Chelsea but last season there was a worse decision against us v man u than any seen on Sunday, and I was extremely angry and pissed off as that pretty much ended the game for us, but I didn't ever seriously think it was all some FA inspired sinister plot within PL football to help United.

Just look at the weekend, there were many **** decisions, in our game v Arsenal, in the Liverpool match, are these teams being paid off by the FA too?

 

You're missing the obvious point being made here Trispin. Nobody is saying that there is a 'FA sinister plot' we are saying that whether conscious or not, there is a bias being made towards more favourable decisions towards Utd, because of the expectation that Utd should get the rub of the green and the public berating of refs by Fergie if they dare not to give them. The problem is exponential, each time Utd get a favourable decision it reinforces the status quo and makes it harder for refs to challenge it the next time.

Your comparison with the Arteta goal is a poor one. Even now after hours of slow motion study and retrospective debate, it's still unclear. What we're talking about here is a long history of favourable decisions given to Utd at the expense of whoever it is they are playing, not a conspiracy against one or another club, but an ingrained culture of expectation that Utd will get the rub of the green.

Think I'm wrong ? I'd suggest that this article will be revived time and again this season. Want to know why ? Because this won't be the last time that decisions go in Utd's favour.

 

That's probably a fair comment. Ultimately, whenever SAF has a go at the ref it gets reported by all the media and there's a big focus on the ref. That always makes it difficult for the PGMO cos they are unwilling to put a ref in a situation where they are going to get excessive media attention. Same reason Clattenburg's been completely dropped for the foreseeable future - nothing to do with Chelsea's power over the FA, purely to do with the media attention he would get if he was selected.

Those are both a bit of a myth imo. There are around 20 top level refs and there doesn't seem to be any sort of fixed rotation - Clattenburg for example didn't ref Liverpool for over three and a half years, then got two LFC games in a few months. People just don't focus on clubs other than Utd.

Other examples - Atkinson hasn't reffed for us since the Spurs game last season where Adebayor had a goal disallowed for handball, and Friend hasn't reffed for us since the 2-0 win against West Brom where he sent off a West Brom player and turned down a good penalty shout for them. Clattenburg was "relegated" to League 1 in 2009 after reffing our 2-1 win over Bolton.

You can spin the "rotation" and "relegation" arguments for refs however you like if you take a very selective look at the facts.

 

Booked him for a red card offence. The exact same offence Scholes was sent off for in the FA Cup semi final. Can you explain that within the bounds of your 'refs are biased' theory?

Had Torres been sent off for that challenge, there would have been almost no controversy whatsoever. Surely if Clattenburg was biased (even subconciously), he would give the uncontroversial decision in Utd's favour rather than painting a big target on his back for the tin hat brigade by sending off Torres when it clearly wasn't a yellow card offence? Or do you think he (subconsciously of course) wants people to find out how biased he is?!?

He made lots of errors in the game (and the previous game he reffed IIRC), and there are more refs than there are top flight games available.

How do you explain Mark Clattenburg being 'relegated' to referee Milwall vs Leeds in League One a week after reffing Utd 2-1 Bolton?