Indecision Time

The appointment of Howard Webb as the referee of the Chelsea game on Sunday has led to some ridiculous comment, he's our ref apparently.  The Telegraph has a statistical breakdown of Webb's refereeing of the 2 teams and concludes,

Webb has been pretty even-handed in his encounters with both teams. Conspiracy theories will point to Manchester United only being penalised for around 12 fouls in each game compared to Chelsea's rate of closer to 15, but the statistics elsewhere are similar enough to demonstrate Webb's lack of bias.

Which doesn't stop the idiots, step forward Martin Samuel, who thinks that Sir Alex was trying to influence the, at the time unpicked, referee of Sunday's game by questioning decisions after the Arsenal game.  Read this - 

Chelsea did get the breaks against Tottenham Hotspur on Saturday, but it is not as if the good fairy of fortune never sprinkles her magic dust on United, either. On the final day of the 2007-08 season, United were extraordinarily lucky against Wigan, when Rio Ferdinand should have given away a first-half penalty and Paul Scholes should have been sent off.

Yes he really has just gone back 3 years to find an occasion where we got a decision in our favour.  Even I wouldn't claim that that was the last break we got, and I'm a little biased towards us...  It really is ridiculous that in the rest of the article he's claiming decisions even out, yet his example is from 3 years ago?  Does he think about what he writes or has he held an impossible grudge for that length of time and only now found occasion to write about it?

He then goes in for a spot of self-contradiction:

Discussing a referee, or his decisions, before a game is considerably more reprehensible than a throwaway comment made in its immediate aftermath. Yet, while the FA banned Ferguson for five matches for saying Martin Atkinson had a rotten game against Chelsea at Stamford Bridge in March - which he did - no action will be taken for the more insidious approach to Sunday's encounter.

Yes, on the one hand comments straight after a game are understandable because they are in the heat of the moment, but on the other the FA should throw the book at Sir Alex for his comments... made straight after the Arsenal game...  Was Martin Samuel never taught how to make a cogent argument?

He has at least learnt the popular Daily Mail rhetorical trick of asking a silly question:

Webb is a good referee, but if his handling of that match had ended with United players accusing him of bias towards Liverpool, would he be present at Old Trafford on Sunday? Probably not, in the current climate. 

Sorry?  I could be wrong but I think this is the first match he's refereed us in since that Liverpool game, so it doesn't really hold up that because we didn't complain about him we get him all the time.

Martin Samuel claims that Sir Alex's attitude is an insult to referees, whereas it seems to me that Samuel's own attitude is the truly insulting one.  He thinks that they can be influenced by a little comment after another game.  If he was a manager I'd hope the FA would throw the book at him for that and for his assertion that Sir Alex can apparently pick and choose referees.  How weak is he suggesting the FA is?

Yes, decisions go for and against, and yet, with the public spotlight having been very much on Sir Alex's comments about referees recently it does seem this season more than usual that decisions haven't gone our way.  And has anyone pointed out to Martin Samuel just how many decisions have gone against us in games against Chelsea in the last few seasons?  It would be an abdication of responsibility if Sir Alex wasn't questioning the refereeing before the game.