Anthony Taylor. Those two words should be enough for any review about this man.
The official who reported Arsene Wenger for telling him to f**k off and who complained he was shoved when Wenger tried to move him out of his personal space, Taylor wasn’t liked much around these parts before that.
An absolutely awful referee, I’ve yet to see him take charge of game and look like he knows what he’s doing. He loves to dish out yellows for nothing while allowing blatant fouls to go unpunished
Just what you need against a lower league side when your side need a result desperately.
As we saw against Sutton, referees tend to allow more to go because of their ‘level’ and pundits commentating have absolutely no problem with this. We haven’t been able to use Mohamed Elneny since that game for a challenge that was unpunished. A number of other events during that game were simply laughed off because ‘non league’.
It’s incredibly patronising, not that Lincoln will care on Saturday.
Expect more of the same at the Emirates – the rules not being applied equally, with Arsenal being punished more often and harder than those plucky little Imps.
Taylor has taken charge of 31 games this season, more than any other referee in the top flight. Unsurprisingly, he’s also handed out the most yellows – 120, an average of just under four per game. He has shown three reds, two of which came in Manchester City’s 3-1 home defeat against Chelsea.
He has not taken charge of one single Arsenal match this season which is surprising for a ref that is seen as one of the top officials in the game by PGMOL. Have Arsenal filed a complaint about him because of his previous performances?
Taylor took charge of five Arsenal matches last season and five the season before that so it strikes me as odd that we haven’t seen him until now. Not that I’m complaining. We saw what happened when he was allowed into the Emirates as a fourth official and we know the havoc he can sow on a football pitch.
For the record, I don’t think Taylor hates Arsenal specifically. I just think he’s a joke of a referee in general. It doesn’t matter what game he’s in charge of, something, somewhere, will go wrong.
That being said, Arsenal tend to win when he’s in charge so I probably shouldn’t complain too much. I will, but I shouldn’t.
Four of the five games we played under him last season were wins (Chelsea, Manchester United, Newcastle, Watford). The fifth was a 2-2 draw at City.