...but I really think we should read what the actual point being made is before responding to it.
Fair enough - which "level playing field" are you wondering about, and if you think it's a concern, who is "unlevelling" it, and for what purpose?
Who is the ref "sucking up" to, and why?
I don't mean to be a dick about it, but there are enough gullible people around already who want to lean into conspiracy bullshit without the cleverest doing so too.
I don't think there's a conspiracy - I don't think there needs to be. I think the testimonies of referees like Clattenburg, their obvious need to be loved by the famous and powerful (for which in turn I must reach for Freudian explanations), explain decades of decisions.
I don't disagree. The problem here is that it's a match between Atletico Madrid and Arsenal.
It's two biggish, also-ran European clubs, neither of whom the powers that be, or the referees who control their matches, give a toss about one way or the other.
It's like saying in a Premier League context that referees are going to be inherently biased to give favourable decisions to, I dunno, Crystal Palace over Everton.
I feel like the purposes are still quite stubbornly being crossed our. The Arsenal penalty was, to me, perfectly justifiable. It just also struck my as the kind of penalty decision that Sunderland are never getting at Stamford Bridge.
I think the crossed purposes is the inference that they got the decision because it's Arsenal and a less glamorous team wouldn't have got that decision.
At this level, nobody gives a shit about Arsenal. At all.
If this conversation was Real Madrid getting a decision against Newcastle, sure. Happy to nod along with "well, the big clubs sometimes get decisions that the smaller clubs don't, and that's just the way of the world".
But here, it's a team that doesn't normally play matches at this level against a slightly bigger team that plays matches at this level a bit more frequently.
I'm fine with your world-view - this is just a bad example of it.
