Grassana Diarra.

Completely evidence-based. Any Arsenal man who has travelled into the shit-holes of the north and midlands to support our guys will confirm the strength of the hatred of The Arsenal amongst the locals. It is undeniable.

On envy transfer, yes for the supporters of northern and midland teams, Chelsea are probably already the most despised London team due to their success and wealth. Arsenal are still well hated though, not so much these days for envy of their onfield abilities, but mostly due to the ridiculous squealing of a vocal minority of their more entitled, fragile fans. Even the self-pitying Scousers find us absurd in that respect.

On the biases of officials from the provinces it will take a bit longer for them to replace Arsenal with Chelsea simply because they are usually in their 30s/40s before they get to ref in the Premier League. When the current batch were growing up as United, Liverpool, etc. fans Chelsea were but a smallish, unthreatening team who occasionally won a cup. Arsenal were the London team to despise. If the same cock-eyed structure with most officials coming from outside London and the south-east continues unreformed then I reckon by 2030s the bias against Chelsea will become more obvious as the young northern and midland boys of the turn of the millenium reach the age to become Premiership refs.

Got it. Colour me totally convinced. I think in years to come this piece of social anthropology will take its place alongside Oscar Lewis's "Five Families" and Wilmott and Young's "Family and Kinship in East London".

So you don't believe Mike Dean to be biased against us, despite a massive statistical disparity over an 18 years sample size (the largest in several decades) that suggest we not only get less preferential decisions from us on average than every other top flight team, but that also we are proportionally over a 3rd less likely with him in charge?

I think about 1/3rd are pretty good on balance, most are just poor at their jobs compared to their predecessors and that Mike Dean and former refs Dowd and Riley were significantly biased to our detriment, as evidenced by statistical outcomes that are widely divergent from the mean.

Re the Chelsea game, I'm not sure I think Taylor is biased, just very inconsistent, and like most humans would in his situation, is guilty of applying the laws with the path of least resistance. ie is influenced by the hostility of the crowd, and the team and particularly the player involved. The same applies more broadly of course, with the media picking up on Puncheon's BAD tackle on De Bruyne and totally declining to mention worse unpunished tackles from Kane & Alli against the same opponents. (Ironically Kane should have been suspended for the last 2 matches in which he got hat-tricks! - and Alli is a nasty cheating piece of work who dives with remarkable success and only gets bookings for leg breakers - usual shtick though - England Team golden boy, all brushed under the carpet. Bit like why Scholes' international and european disciplinary record was so much worse than domesitcally).

The game is on ESPN2 in Aus.

Yeah he probably doesn't like us much as I've said elsewhere - my point was simply that he is also a total *%^@ in general. And bad decisions like WBA do happen to all clubs from one ref or another. There is no general bias or conspiracy against Arsenal though.

Your last para is a bit of a stream of consciousness.

There's statistical evidence that we get worse results with Dean reffing, not that we get worse results because of poor decisions from Dean. Enormous difference if you want to venture into the realm of statistics.

That's my biggest problem with fans making these sort of arguments (and fans from ALL clubs make them); it's too much conspiracy theory rhetoric and too many bold claims being made without proper support. It reminds me of how truthers look for anything that's even remotely peculiar and then try to cram a completely developed (and made up) theory into that tiny hole.

Basically, if you want to claim that it's strange how we get noticably worse results with Dean that's fair enough. If you then want to claim this is evidence of bias you're making a huge leap from the factual to the made-up. That claim needs further and much more specific evidence.

1 - 0

Knew that was coming ....

Game on.

Another defensive debacle. Nobody following the runner.

Yay !

1 - 1 - BFG

Per !!!!!!!!

Pathetic. A free kick which is closer than a corner, arsenal leave a forest player with a free run right on top of Ospina who heads in completely unchallenged. The 2 arsenal players in the wall clearly play him onside.

What on earth are arsenal doing. There is no plan, no clue and no accountability for the unacceptable way we defend set pieces.

Now we score a set piece! Per prodding one home 1-1

Nicely finished.

I would credit the opposition for a clever set piece myself.

Jon Moss. Sunderland. Join the dots.

Ooh should have been 2-1

Nelson is playing in an advanced position

Surely arsenal should know that with our wall virtually on the deadball line there is basically no offside. So why decide to defend 6 yards out and not track a runner who finishes a yard from goal?
The delivery was excellent though. As was Theo’s free kick for our goal

Even average championship teams with a striker willing to make runs can drop a ball over the top of our defence for a clear run on goal.

Well it is now.

And a nice goal at that ...

2-1 forest, great finish but the defence again just can’t clear their lines. All fat too easy for forest.
Wenger quite simply doesn’t give a damn about the amount of goals we concede, even to average teams, bottom of prem, championship, Europa League fodder. Everyone can score against us very very easily

Very much deserved, Ospina had kept us in it with a few good saves prior.

Need to drastically improve second half.

Disappointed you spell it Lichaj because it sounds a bit like Lee High which would make him an obvious candidate for Bromley's Drugs Eleven.

I thought we looked quite lively going forward, but to the surprise of no one on the planet wide open at the back.

Wenger can give 2 goals to absolutely anybody.

Any team in England can score 2 goals againest us literally. There are no easy games

I think I go in to every arsenal game thinking I wouldn’t be surprised at any result, win lose or draw.
Chelsea at home? Could be any result
West Brom away? Same

I think the only arsenal games that don’t shock me are when we go away to a big, big team. Then I know we won’t win and only a draw and loss are available

If we turn up we can beat the best, if we don’t we can lose to the worst.

Very good goal from Lichaj

Our tactic of playing without a defence today is not working well so far.

.

This is what a FA cup tie is all about ... little team get stuck in and winning [ at the moment ]
What sh*ts me from the Arsenal point of view ; is our lack of adventure
F*** ng around with the ball ....cross field , back passes all accurate as soon as we pass forward they are misplaced , overhit ....... plus lack of movement from the front runners

it's in our DNA we can't change .

Forest are moving the ball accurately creating chances .

Could be further ahead .... Arsene's message at half time ..remember Reading

Per needs to get in to his coaching role asap. Any average striker with an ounce of pace takes him to pieces partly because he is given zero protection. Defence is so disorganised.
I get that wenger hasn’t, doesn’t and won’t ever organise a defence, he doesn’t know how. But I still would have thought a group of professional footballers could work something out for themselves that resembled a plan.

This is why I cannot wait for a new manager because there are so many easy wins with this squad.

Even by our standards that defending has been hilarious ... we're gonna lose this 4-1.

More eloquently the same point I've made on here for year - I remember having discussions with Harlow about it. The PGMOL has been run out of Manchester and disproportionally full of refs from Lancs, Cheshire & Manc for a couple of decades now, with a likewise high % from Yorkshire. Is it really likely that those three counties are really twice as good at producing referees than the rest of England and Wales combined? I've read before that there is a significant regional divide withing the PGMOL, and refs often feel pressured to relocate to one of the above areas in order to get to ref in the top flight.

Quite apart from any accusations of bias, that regional distrubution can't be right. The last ref based in the south East in the top flight bar the aforementioned Graham Scott was Steve Bennett who retired 8 years ago.

Watched their first goal again. Why oh why is noboby picking up Lichaj?

Who remembers that 5th round tie away at Forest in 79 the comms mentioned. I think the most nerve wracking 20 minutes of Sportsnight I ever saw.

Caesar can feel the knives being sharpened...

Agree on both counts