In the midst of a match, it may seem as if some referees have personal vendettas or a heightened sense of affinity toward certain clubs, but it’s quite difficult to prove that theory. We can speculate all we want, but taking a look at the data could shed some light on what’s potentially going on regarding officiator biases. Specifically looking at how often referees hand out yellow and red cards in top football leagues across the world, we can compare and contrast the refereeing tendencies on both macro and micro levels. For example, which league’s clubs get carded the most overall? Which refe ..read more

Key Takeaways • Overall, the most common offenses leading to football-related arrests at English Premier League matches since 2014 were public disorder (30.7%), violent disorder (16.6%), and alcohol offenses/DWI (16.6%). • Leeds United fans have been arrested the most for football-related offenses – 305 arrests in total. • 65% of English Premier League fans claimed to be not at all or only slightly tolerant of unruly behavior at soccer matches.    Football Hooligans Few things are as inherently English as a football match. Sure, there’s the classic breakfast fry up or tea with a side ..read more

Key Takeaways • Just over half of online discussions about soccer referee decisions in European leagues were negative. • Among the big five European soccer leagues, the Serie A online community had the largest ratio of negative posts and comments regarding referees – over 78% of all posts and comments had a negative sentiment. • Among the largest soccer teams in Europe, Manchester City’s online community had the most critical view of referees and their in-game decisions – 60.9% of posts and comments carried a negative sentiment.   Fans’ Take on Referees Soccer fandom stretches far and w ..read more

Online soccer betting is a great option for those who love sports and want to have some fun with friends on the weekends. But the world of gambling can seem too complicated for beginners, and beginners also tend to make the most common mistakes. For your guidance, we’ve compiled professionally approved tips on how to bet on soccer with bookmakers like 22Bet Bonus, one of the top sports betting platforms on the internet. Tips for Betting on Online  Soccer Markets Any gambler can find a host of betting options. As you may have noticed, soccer bets are popular particularly as they’re simpler ..read more

Let’s face it, we have all been there. It’s Saturday morning. A new day, with plenty of football and immense opportunity. “Today will be the day!”, you pledge to yourself as you ultimately begin to waste more money on accumulators. The problem is, we are forward-thinking dreamers. We have all—at one time or another—imagined landing that mega accumulator, the 100/1 (or higher) total long-shot that plays into the bookmaker’s hands. But, it’s possible?! Sure, as is the lottery. Like with the lottery, we are influenced by the fact that someone will win it and are reminded of this fact with clever ..read more

When betting, we often lean towards more absolute outcomes. Who will win the game? A or B? How many goals will be scored? How many corners? The list goes on, but for most of us, we will rarely bet on there being exactly 6 corners or exactly 2 goals. The same is true for betting on the result of a match. Bettors rarely bet on the draw even though the odds are often very generous. Draws are a little trickier to predict, but we are aiming to make it a little easier with our latest release. We have created a brand-new page dedicated to betting on draws. It aims to help you make better choices if a ..read more

After adding plenty more card stats to FootyStats recently and after launching our interactive Foul Map, we wanted to take this new data even further. Today, we’re creating our very own football team. Introducing Booking XI, the most aggressive team assembled! We have taken all of the card data from 2019/2020 and picked the players that will take us to record heights, especially in terms of cards received! To keep things interesting, the FootyStats team was not allowed to pick any players currently playing in South America. We will be playing a 5-3-2 formation, with an “all-out defence” attitu ..read more

Due to the ongoing pandemic, the way football fans consume fixtures has changed drastically in 2020 but has the product itself changed? In this article—that will be continuously updated throughout the season—we will look at the difference in statistics between the Premier League in 2020/2021 and the 2019/2020 season which, for the most part, was COVID-free. Are we seeing more goals, more fouls, more away wins? Players were starved of a traditional pre-season this year and can no longer rely on the home advantage that would so often come from the 12th man, the fans. Goals Scored Pandemic or not ..read more

There’s a common feeling among football fans that South American football and the leagues inside the continent are more aggressive. Today, we will dig deeper into this theory using data from FootyStats. We will be focusing on the number of fouls per game, a great metric when it comes to betting on card markets. We could look at the number of cards, but that’s often an indication of referee leniency as opposed to the general aggression being shown by the players. Also, if there are more fouls being committed, it could lead to fewer cards being shown as the referees will know and accept that a c ..read more

FootyStats is putting fouls on the map, literally. We are delighted to launch Foul Map, the first of what we hope to be many interesting experiments in how we view football data. Visualizing data this way allows you to explore stats with ease and spot patterns in no time. If you like betting on card markets, you will love this new addition. The new page plots each completed league from last season on an interactive map, showing the average fouls per game for that specific league. Each league is color-coded, with green signifying a competition with a low number of fouls and a red label showing ..read more