Referee: Indictment of our Game

When the going gets weird, the weird turns pro. He is the most hated, blamed and is the centre of attraction in the midst of all chaos in a field. “The Hand of God” incident, Chelsea- Barcelona 2009 semifinal were the referee’s decisions made Drogba go nuts, Nani’s Red Card against Madrid, Suarez’s nail “biting” finish and other bizarre decisions.

As they continue to dominate the headlines of all Sports, referees’ decisions reflect their psychological factors, loosely based on the popular beliefs of a book published by Tobias Moskowitz and Jon Wertheim.

Sports is a multi-billion dollar industry with abundance of readily available data, on everything from the most commonly used tactics in Football to the most number of ducks by a Batsman in Cricket. Sport provides the perfect tools for economic analysis in decision making, which are rarely studied.

Whenever ESPN says “All said and done, the better team lost today”, it’s always the Judgment day for referees. Sir Alex Ferguson, one of the best managers in English Football, denies that Manchester United have benefited more than any other team in referee decisions. However, he has accepted that bigger clubs gets more favorable decisions at crucial times when compared to smaller clubs.

This bias is found in officials when they try to answer the question why home teams win more often than away teams. The home team wins 54% of games in Major League Baseball, 60% in International Cricket, 63% in English Premier League soccer and 69% in American college basketball. Little evidence have been shown in this where players being more familiar with the stadium results in bad decisions. Evidences mainly shows referees favoring home teams on major decisions, especially at a crucial stage of the game.

Are these deliberately biased? Like any other person, the referees also unintentionally tend to rely on the crowd, making decisions based on the crowd’s reaction. However, this is not observed during derbies. 23% reduce in fouls, 26% decrease in yellow cards and a extraordinary 70% decrease in red cards in favor of the home team, was observed in Italy for 21 matches without the crowd. Football always stands among the others, often blamed for its reluctance to use technology. 2013/14 BPL season is the first time that Goal line technology is going to be used in football. Finally, the linesmen can live a peaceful life.

Referees also tend to have a soft corner for the big clubs during league matches. Recently sacked Manchester City Manager Roberto Mancini has claimed that Manchester United benefits from referee decisions more than any other club. In Turkish Super League, bias is higher for matches involving clubs from remote areas.

With the fans’ eyes glued to the officials and with the players’ right under their nose, it’s not much that the referees can do. It’s a pity that for all the 90 mins of running behind the ball, they can’t even have a shot.