Expect to see a moderated version of referees at finals

ANTHONY TAYLOR refereed the Premier League game between Liverpool and Manchester City and overlooked foul after foul. The commentator said: “I hope he referees like this at the World Cup”. He will not. If he did that in his first game he would not get a second.

Refereeing differs around the world. What fans like in some places they do not like in others. And referees try to give fans what they want – though you would not think so to hear fans complaining about referees.

When a referee progresses from national to continental or global competition they have to adapt – otherwise the next appointment will go to somebody else.

There will be two English referees at the World Cup – Taylor and Michael Oliver. Both have refereed in the Champions League since 2016-17. During those six and a half seasons both awarded 21 fouls per game in the Premier League and 25 in the Champions League, about the same as other Champions League referees.

In many bookings markets each yellow counts as ten points and each red as 25 points. In the Premier League Oliver averaged 35 points and Taylor 38 points. In the Champions League both averaged 49 points, a bit higher than others.

If you are going to bet on cards in Qatar forget what you have seen referees do outside Qatar. You will not see that version of them in Qatar. You will see a Fifa version.

The average bookings makeup across the last six World Cups was 44. Each of those tournaments had the same number of games and the same format as there will be in Qatar.

The average makeups for referees from different Fifa regional confederations included 42 for South America, 45 for Europe, 45 for Concacaf (North and Central America and the Caribbean) and 48 from Asia. All those numbers are similar.

Others were lower. The average makeup was 39 for referees from Africa and 32 for referees from Oceania. But there were hardly any games refereed by officials from Oceania, and the next lowest total was for referees from Africa. Small samples can give misleading impressions. Those might.

At the last two World Cups, for referees from all round the globe, the average makeup was lower than at the previous four.

In the four tournaments between 1998 and 2010 the average bookings makeup was 50. For the two since then – 2014 and 2018 – it was 33. This might be because Fifa stopped, hopefully for good, the reckless practice of making significant law changes that were used for the first time in the most important competition of all. It was asking for trouble and trouble is what it got.