Lack of penalties awarded to us
It seems as though we have not had a penalty awarded in for ever. I make it December 11th 2021 in the league, with none this calendar year. Does anyone know whether it is approaching some kind of record?
Also, any theories as to why this is? We seemed to generate a lot of penalties in the promotion season even though our style was about long balls to Bayo. Whereas we now have players like Mehmeti who can wriggle into the box, but we don't seem to get hacked down!
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You'd think the logic would be that the more attacking a team you are, the more time you'll have the ball in and around the opposition's box. So on sheer percentages you have more chance of pens.
Add in tricky pacy players on top and that seems to be the recipe.
Not sure if the season you quote was an anomaly or what figures we are talking, but we don't feed our wide players enough in the right positions or have lion shares of possession enough I suppose?
There's generally no correlation between touches in the box and how many pens you win
Thanks both - I guess I am puzzled because we were not really an attacking team in the Close Quarters season either, but seemed to win a ton of pens. We are three months away from completing a calendar year without one, so this run includes around half of last season too - 24 matches last season and 10 this season, so 34 overall or 37 if you include playoffs. Seeing as we were out of the cup competitions by then, we are also at 41 for all competitions if you include Papa Johns and LC from this year.
Surely that is an unusually long run without a penalty being awarded?
(Side note: Yes, I am also begging for a penalty against Plymouth tomorrow).
There must be a correlation between time spent in the box and penalties though surely.
Ok, so there's more correlation than I thought, but there's still quite a lot of randomness involved. We had the third-most touches in the oppo box last season but won the joint fewest pens. Best example last season is probably from L2: Port Vale - 1,036 touches in oppo box, 0 pens | Sutton - 1,006 touches in oppo box, 10 pens.
This is League One last season. Ok, so the three teams with the most pens were also among the highest for oppo box touches, but the vast majority of the league only won three or four pens regardless of touches. There's not NO correlation, but there's not enough of one to draw any grand conclusions from.
Vale haven't been awarded a penalty since 21st April 2021, so we're not even on the longest barren run! But we play them soon, so you know what that means...
Perhaps our reputation for “the dark arts” precedes us?
I can’t back this up with any official declaration on the matter, but I also feel that refs had been told to let the game flow a lot more from last season - there was a whole bunch more fouling and manhandling than has previously been allowed, and we were both the beneficiaries and losers of such decisions, depending on the extent of shithousery practised by the opposition.
And perhaps the “benefit of the doubt” was extended to penalties also, i.e. don’t give it unless it’s absolutely stonewall.
You also have to consider the type of touches a team is having in the box. A big chunk of ours last season will have been Vokes headers. There will be a more accurate way of analysing this, but I think we've largely just been unlucky.
Great analysis all! Yes, we have certainly been unlucky with some stonewallers to. Hanlan from last season and Mehmeti from this season spring to mind, where the player was basically assaulted, revived and assaulted again within a blink from the ref.
If JJ is not playing, who do we want on penalties? Vokes? Wing? Anis? Maybe even Obita?
The refs have been under a directive to allow more stuff that would have been fouls in previous years too haven't they?
Unless that's only the prem?
I reckon Anis. Ought to be a better taker now.
It does seem like every level for sure - which is something I definitely like. Now if they can just add:
1 - No opposition player is allowed to touch or obstruct the ball once a free kick, corner or throw has been awarded.
2 - Only captains may talk to the referee concerning a decision.
3 - Throws and goal kicks must be taken within ten seconds.
...we would be getting somewhere.
A foul being given and the player picking it up and running off with it, is one of those infuriating things in the game.
A new rule where if you purposely touch the ball after giving a free kick away should be treated in the kicking the ball away locker.
I saw a local ref take a different stance. The player that fouled the attacker, picked up the ball and jogged for 10 yrds with it before letting it go. The ref then allowed the team to take the free-kick from that position!
He said 'I couldn't remember where the foul happened so I'll take your guidance!'
Safe to say, no one touched the ball after conceeding a free kick again in that match!
A few times at games I've shouted similar, we'll take it from there then!
But you know the refs would get marked down on it by those dreaded assessors.
And players would just start running off with it, then do that annoying throw it up in the air, so it takes a while to come down and buy more time routine.
Stealing 10 yards on throw ins is just as annoying in fairness.
"WHERE'S HE GOING"
The annoying thing is how easy it would be to stamp out, compared to other types of gamesmanship (such as feigning injury).
I think we would definitely be the losers of point 3 @Shev
That’s an amazing statistic I hadn’t realised it had been so long
thing is defenders can’t get near enough to Anis in the box to foul him
Anis was rugby tackled in the penalty area by a Burton defender in the first minute of our match against them this season so it really shouldn't have been as long as it is
Just had a look at the most fouled players in League One this season and Anis ranks... =136th.
Just to rub this thread in more, today happens!
I actually think a fairly simple rule change could sort this our quite quickly. Once the whilstle is blown for a free kick, the offending team's players must retreat 10 yards from the site of the foul immediately. No one on the defending team may touch the ball. Any player who does not can be cautioned. A little bit rugby league, but very straightforward to officiate and players would soon get the message.
I sometimes think the reason it's hard to enforce these rules is that a yellow card actually feels too harsh a sanction and referees want to use them spaaringly. If you wanted something a bit more radical, awarding a corner to the attacking team for these kinds of infringements would be an interesting experiment.
They tried that, of you remember, even moving the kick forward by 10yds for the infringement but it didn't last.
I’m not at all clued up on correlations with touches. All I can say is that, despite disappointing recent results, we seem to spend a lot more time in opposition boxes these days (at least in first halves) with a disturbingly low conversion rate.
There seems to be a lack of aggression (or perhaps sharpness would be a better word) on our part in crowded penalty areas, possibly due to a lack of confidence.
Yesterday, Chris Forino was present for all (?) our corners but was frustrated in the first half by overhit efforts which sailed over him at the far post. In the second half he made contact with one, only to be bundled to the deck (incurring an injury which I sincerely hope proves to be just a knock, slight muscle strain or, ideally, cramp), I thought at the time that there might have been a case for a penalty but, to be fair, given the fact that referees now allow so much grappling, barging and shirt-pulling In crowded boxes, there was no real chance of it being given.
In the context of the greater leniency this season towards physical contact, it would be interesting to see statistics on numbers of penalties this season (across the EFL) compared with last season at the same stage and, perhaps more relevantly, the comparable number of yellow cards. I’d expect the former to be much the same; the latter to be lower
Apologies for length.
They did, and it either gave very little advantage because a free kick 10 yards further ahead in your own half isn't really a significant deterrent for stopping an opportunity to break at speed, or because it gave a huge advantage with free kicks inside the penalty area, etc. A corner would seem to be a helpful middle ground. Not that I expect it to happen, obviously.