After an interminable international break, the SPFL Premiership was back with Celtic at Livingstone and The Rangers hosting Hibernian.
The impact of big calls being incorrect can then be evaluated using the framework outlined here -> Honest Mistakes in the SPFL.
30/03/24 The Rangers vs Hibernian
Incident 1
| Referee | David Dickinson |
| Game Minute | 20th |
| Score At Time | 0-0 |
| Incident | Triantis and Souttar challenge for a corner cross |
| Outcome | No decision; Penalty to TRFC following VAR review |
| Evidence | BBC iPlayer – Sportscene – Premiership Highlights 2023/24: 30/03/2024
At 2:51 |
Incident 2
| Referee | David Dickinson |
| Game Minute | 21st |
| Score At Time | 0-0 |
| Incident | Wright scores for TRFC from a penalty rebound |
| Outcome | Goal disallowed for encroachment following VAR review |
| Evidence | BBC iPlayer – Sportscene – Premiership Highlights 2023/24: 30/03/2024
At 4:04 |
| Yorkshire Whistler Verdict | Initial on field decision: Goal to Rangers but after Var review goal disallowed for encroachment.
We see Tavernier’s penalty saved and then Wright follows in and slots home the rebound. After VAR review the goal is correctly disallowed as Wrights foot is just inside the 18 yard box as Tavernier strikes the penalty. Similar to offside decisions reviewed by VAR, there is no element of subjectivity here, its more black & white. He is either in or out the box and in this case by virtue of his right boot he is adjudged already in the box and therefore encroaching. Correct decision in law, although I would say without the benefit of VAR, with how tight this call was, without VAR I would be incredibly surprised if any referee or assistant referee would have seen the encroachment given how marginal it was. Verdict: CORRECT DECISION |
| Expected Points
Outcome |
No impact |
31/03/24 Livingston vs Celtic
Incident 1
| Referee | Don Robertson |
| Game Minute | 37th |
| Score At Time | 0-0 |
| Incident | Kyogo goes down in the box under challenge from Devlin |
| Outcome | No decision: it is unclear if any VAR review took place |
| Evidence | BBC iPlayer – Sportscene – Premiership Highlights 2023/24: Highlights: Livingston v Celtic
At 6:03 |
| Yorkshire Whistler Verdict | Initial on field decision: No decision, VAR reviewed as well.
Low ball gets played into the penalty area, Kyogo tries to get to the ball before the defender and from the resulting challenge, the Celtic player goes to ground claiming a foul. In real time, Devlin didn’t appear to get much on the ball and upon watching the slow motion replay my suspicions are confirmed. Devlin does not see Kyogo who comes from behind and as Devlin stretches his right foot to play the ball he only succeeds in clipping the rear left ankle of Kyogo. Very surprised that VAR did not recommend an on field review here. Verdict: INCORRECT DECISION. Penalty to Celtic expected outcome. |
| Expected Points
Outcome |
Celtic -0.54 xPts |
Summary
My thanks as always to the Yorkshire Whistler.
This season was looking more promising in terms of refereeing standards. The error rate as identified by the independent expert was down from over 30 percent to around 20 percent. Celtic seemed to be getting the penalties expected, for example. There was still a relative lack of jeopardy down Ibrox way of course.
But since John Beaton decided to re-referee the game at Tynecastle and scupper Celtic from getting ahead in a very tight title race with a very lucrative Champions League pot at the end of it, we seem to be regressing.
Two very poor calls this week, who benefits? The failure of Alan Muir on VAR at Livingston to check the challenge on Kyogo AT ALL (at best if there was a review, it was over in 10-15 seconds) is baffling.
In terms of the overall position:
The Rangers have 0.84 MORE points and Celtic 1.37 LESS than expected due to the impact of Honest Mistakes. The Rangers are benefiting by an estimated 2.21 xPts due to the impact of honest mistakes.
Celtic lead by one point having played one game more.
Note: due to a cut-and-paste error by the author (a genuine honest mistake if you will) The Rangers xPts total was inflated by 0.15 – now corrected this issue.
The outcome we suspected, it feels like the SFA are doubling down on Celtic for having the audacity to challenge them. Will we be surprised if we see more honest mistakes this weekend?
Seen it quite a bit now.
Devlin ( who has previous but anyway ) tackles from behind.
His knee goes into the back of Kyogo’s causing it to buckle instantly.
We used to do it in primary school for a laugh.
To not give a penalty was debatable, to not use VAR is plain cheating.
Again.
I think it is important to state what it is that we are expecting to see.
I can’t speak for anyone else but what I would expect to see over the course of say 5 seasons would be not much of a swing either way in “Expected points” if games were being refereed fairly and mistakes were genuinely random.
I don’t expect (even the best and most impartial) refs to get every single decision correct and I wouldn’t expect that every season all the mistakes to balance out perfectly evenly either. Someone is bound to get lucky now & again and benefit from a timely refereeing blunder at a crucial juncture.
What I would expect to see over 5 years would be something like 2 or 3 seasons where Celtic come out slightly better off and 2 or 3 seasons where rangers come out slightly better off. By “Slightly better off” I mean no more than a 3pt swing either way over 38 league games.
Something like:
Season One – Celtic +1.8xp
Season Two – rangers +1.65xp etc….
With the running 5 year total being virtually dead even
We’re now almost at the end of Season 3 of this and rangers came out significantly better off in the first two full seasons and are currently at the upper end of the “Slightly better off” scale as we approach the business end of Season 3.
So unless there are some horrendous refereeing errors in Celtic’s favour (stop laughing!) over the next 7 league games, we’re looking at 3/3 seasons in rangers favour and a running XP advantage in excess of 11pts or so.
There is no doubt now in my mind that this “pattern of assistance” warrants further scrutiny from professional football analysts who have more time & resources at their disposal to look this in much more detail.
Nailed it Charlie
Not even looking at VAR for the Kyogo penalty is abysmal. And shows that as long as humans decide what to review the issues won’t go.
The YW was right again and this week’s instalment is very, very worrying as a trend.
Rangers do not have 0.83 more points than expected.
They have an xg 0.83 more than they would have if these decisions had bee called correctly
Celtic do not have 1.37 less than expected, they have 1.37 xg less than they would have had these decisions been called correctly.
Celtic got 3 points last werk despite the ‘honest mistake’. The could not have got more points than that.
I sa
Hi – sorry I have no idea what you are talking about. You seem to have completely misunderstood the xPts model, which is a common trait amongst certain fan groups.
The explanation is available on this site though.
You say
The Rangers have 0.84 MORE points and Celtic 1.37 LESS than expected
Tbis is incorrect. What is correct is
The Rangers have 0.84 MORE Xpts and Celtic 1.37 LESS than expected
rather like Nick Walsh at the weekend, by missing out bits you make the case rather compelling whereas if you had shown the full sentence it would make sense
Having said that I am happy to tighten up the wording in tomorrow’s Derby edition