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Bates referees QPR's trip to Swansea
Bates referees QPR's trip to Swansea
Tuesday, 21st Oct 2008 10:07

Anthony Bates is the referee for our match this evening, fresh from an all too rare example of common sense refereeing at Crystal Palace on Saturday.

Swansea City v Queens Park Rangers
Referee: Tony Bates (Staffordshire)

Assistants – Hendley (West Midlands) and Swabey (Devon)
Fourth Official – Ihringova (Shropshire)


Wasn’t it good to see Rob Styles back to his incompetent, game wrecking best on Monday night? For those that weren’t fortunate enough to see the Newcastle Man City game Styles reduced the home side to ten men and awarded Newcastle a penalty after 12 minutes and sent off their full back Beye after he executed a fantastic, ball winning tackle on Robinho as he ran through on goal. The tackle cleanly took the ball before making any contact with the man and when he finally did clip Robinho it was not malicious or against the rules, say like Michael Dawson’s was at the weekend. Yet Styles gave a penalty and sent the man off. That tackle was every bit as skilful as a Robinho flick or a Ronaldo dribble and should have been rewarded with a standing ovation, not first use of the bath water.

Styles of course shouldn’t even have been there, he should be in action tonight in our league because he gave another monumentally shocking decision at Man Utd v Bolton the other week – another penalty – but avoided demotion because he apologised, under duress, for the call. I’m tempted to say the people that make these appointments got everything they deserve on Monday night as another crass decision was made live on television but then after the match Graham Poll tried to defend the decision as a good one so Hackett and the boys are probably happy with it. Tackling is part of the game and you’re unlikely to ever see a better one than Beye’s – the fact that Poll and Styles both believe it was a foul and a penalty highlights the different things referees want from a game compared to players, fans and managers. You will struggle to find anybody in football other than a referee that thinks that is a foul, and it will be equally hard to trace anybody who wants to see superb tackles like that punished.

The Newcastle game came at the end of a weekend where two other televised games were ruined by sendings off. Tottenham were up against it enough at Stoke already without Gareth Bale’s red card, although it was difficult to argue with that decision. It was very similar to Beye’s in many ways except he got nowhere near the ball and the referee was right. I do wonder in these situations whether the red card should be rescinded and the player allowed to return to the field if the penalty isn’t scored – the goal being punishment enough.

There can be no defence whatsoever of Mike Dean in the Sheffield derby who cost Sheffield United the game with a crass over reaction to a high boot from Matthew Kilgallon. If that’s a red card we’re all in trouble.

For all of that credit must be given to our referee at Swansea this evening Anthony Bates. You may have seen Bates showing good common sense at Crystal Palace on Saturday, awarding Palace a stone wall penalty after Muller upended Moses when through on goal but not sending the goalkeeper off – that’s absolutely fine by me, I’ve already seen three games ruined by hash sendings off this week and it was good to see a referee actually leaving a player on. So far this season Bates has a pleasingly low card count of 24 yellows (2 a game) and one red from 12 matches. Four of those games, and 11 of the yellow cards, have been in the Championship – an average boosted by a six card haul in the Blackpool v Barnsley game last month.

Last season he showed 85 yellows (2.361 a match) and two reds in 36 games. His biggest s ingle game haul was six yellow cards, which happened on three occasions. He was in charge for Coventry’s 2-1 win at Loftus Road before Christmas, showing no cards. A mark of seven in that match good enough for joint fifth position on the referee league.

Referee: Tony Bates (Staffordshire) 7 No cards all night which I like to see, always rather see the players be allowed to have a proper man's match rather than being whistled at and booked all the time. Having said that there one or two naughty ones he missed, particularly the one by Best on Mancienne that rendered him half fit for the remainder of the half. Sadly let down by two abysmal linesman, particularly the one on the Ellerslie Road side. I'd like to take his flag and smack him round the head with it. LFW Coventry Match Report

In 2006/07 Bates was in charge of QPR twice, against Luton and Leeds. The FA Cup tie against the Hatters saw the infamous ‘hand of Baidoo’ goal that won Rangers a replay. Reading through the reviews and looking at his stats he does seem to have become much less card happy in recent times. An average rating of four for the two games in 2006/07 left Bates languishing in 26th on the referee league for that season.

Referee: Mr A Bates 4 Failed to produce cards for several fouls from both teams that really deserved them. Also got the game's two crucial decisions wrong - Rangers should have had a penalty in the first half and their second goal should never have stood. Ably assisted by a couple of poor linesmen - the one at the Loft End in the first half wouldn't know the offside law if it walked up and introduced itself to him. LFW Luton Match Report

Ref: T Bates (Staffordshire) 4 - Did my head in this bloke. Six bookings he made in this game. SIX! There was barely a bad tackle in the match. Picky, constant whistling, desperately looking for an offence from every corner and free kick. Piss poor. LFW Leeds Match Report

His last Swansea game was a 1-0 home defeat by MK Dons in the Johnstone Paint Trophy in February where three yellow cards were shown.

A full programme of Championship football tonight and Andy Hall has Blackpool v Derby – pity the poor sods going to watch that match. Lower down Trevor Kettle, fresh from five yellows and two penalties at Southampton at the weekend, has Brentford v Morecambe. Looking further ahead the officials for our televised game with Reading are yet to be confirmed so perhaps we can look forward to a nice surprise later in the week – more on that on Thursday evening.

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