Clattenburg finally apologises
Mark Clattenburg has finally apologised (of sorts) for his biased, one-eyed, fawning performance in the Goodison derby 12 years ago
I see Mark Clattenburg has finally apologised (of sorts) for his biased, one-eyed, fawning performance in the Goodison derby 12 years ago that still rankles with Evertonians to this day. Here’s the article:
Mark Clattenburg has acknowledged he made two major mistakes that cost Everton in the ferocious 2007 Merseyside derby that he believes was one of the worst performances of his long career. The former referee’s name has long been anathema to Blues.
Liverpool won 2-1 at Goodison Park in an ill-tempered affair that saw the visitors awarded two penalties and both Tony Hibbert and Phil Neville sent off for the hosts.
Clattenburg is content with those calls but has now acknowledged he was wrong on two major points of contention -- his failure to show Dirk Kuyt a red card for his lunge on Neville and to not award Everton a penalty in the final seconds when Jamie Carragher hauled down Joleon Lescott. He said those decisions have since haunted him.
“I lost control, I lost focus, I lost the ability to make decisions.”
He brought up the game when asked what fixture he would love to referee again in the hope of performing better.
He said: “I was only one year into my Premier League career and I was given the Manchester derby, the following week I was given the north London derby, and then the week after I was appointed to referee Everton vs Liverpool.
“And I’m not saying it as an excuse but I hadn’t experienced this type of derby before. I’ve just named two derbies that are totally different derbies. This was ferocious, this was a working-class derby [the type] that I had experienced as a fan, Newcastle United [Clattenburg is a Newcastle supporter] and Sunderland, but I hadn’t experienced as a referee. And I just got it completely wrong.”
Clattenburg stuck by his decisions to show straight red cards to Hibbert and Neville in both penalty incidents and made clear that, contrary to some claims at the time, then Liverpool captain Steven Gerrard did not cause him to upgrade Hibbert’s punishment from a yellow card.
He said: “Everton fans think that I’ve changed my mind because Steven Gerrard was walking past the camera when I’m changing the pockets… I’ve pulled out the wrong card and I’m thinking it’s not a yellow card, it’s a red card. It’s a denial of an obvious goal-scoring opportunity. But they think that Steven Gerrard said something which clearly never happened.
“It’s just because he was walking past the camera when I have changed the cards, but it was always a red card, which was [for] Tony Hibbert. And I sent off Phil Neville for a handball on the line.”
While Clattenburg held firm on those calls, he acknowledged errors elsewhere in the match.
He said: “The big mistake was there was a challenge by Dirk Kuyt where he goes airborne.
“He doesn’t make contact, but he jumps into a challenge. So when you watch the still and you watch the video back, you go, how is he not sent off?
“And I took advice from the assistant referee who was very experienced and who I probably thought I should rely on because he had more seniority. He was more experienced than I was. He’d officiated in these derbies many, many times. I hadn’t. And I took his advice. He’d said a yellow card and I’d give a yellow card, which was a mistake, a mistake in Everton’s eyes.
“But the worst mistake was near the end of the game. As the ball gets played in, I don’t see anything, I don’t see one thing.
“I don’t know if I’m just mentally fatigued or what was going on in my mind but Jamie Carragher has pulled down Joleon Lescott for an easy penalty.
“We talk about football understanding, if I had given this penalty and Everton had the chance to equalise, I would have got some criticism in the game but I wouldn’t have got the huge criticism that I received.
“Because by not awarding that penalty, in Everton’s eyes, correctly… all the big decisions seemed to go against Everton and everything went in favour of Liverpool.”
Clattenburg, who oversaw almost 300 Premier League games and reffed the finals of both the Champions League and Euros in 2016, said it was years before he was involved in another Blues game and that, while he believed some of the criticism that followed went too far, he accepted the magnitude of his mistakes made a backlash inevitable.
Reader Comments (34)
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2 Posted 17/10/2025 at 13:45:24
3 Posted 17/10/2025 at 13:49:19
I can't wait to hear from that twat Pierluigi Collina next.
That'll really make up for it.
All refs are the same. Like old bill. There's a reason people become refs or cops.
4 Posted 17/10/2025 at 14:11:19
You won't hear a peep from Collina.
That was definitely a brown envelope job.
5 Posted 17/10/2025 at 14:15:19
6 Posted 17/10/2025 at 14:19:04
I always thought it was what he said thar got Clattenberg banned from reffing us.
7 Posted 17/10/2025 at 14:19:22
8 Posted 17/10/2025 at 14:21:04
I got some redshite mates who need to read it.
9 Posted 17/10/2025 at 15:35:00
But it is all pretty meaningless because they are not doing anything about it. They will say VAR -- but we know exactly how that is now being used to favour the big teams... and the application is fundamentally inconsistent when they deliberately refuse to correct certain errors, like was it a goal-kick or a corner?
Will it get to the stage where they give a team a point or 3 in recompense for their errors? I can't see it happening but, if they were happy to arbitrarily take points off us in the dubious name of alleged sporting advantage, what about giving us points back when it's a proven case of sporting disadvantage as a direct result of their incompetence... or subconcious bias?
10 Posted 17/10/2025 at 15:51:11
the Lescott one was the real shocker though. I actually think the referees have now for some years taken it as a badge of honour to not give Everton certain decisions at home if the crowd are up, as evidence they can't be influenced (and of course we are a great club for that, insofar as we have vociferous fans, but zero pull off the pitch).
11 Posted 17/10/2025 at 16:13:26
How do "we know exactly how that is now being used to favour the big teams"?
ESPN tracks the impact of VAR on an ongoing basis throughout the season. Here's the final "who got the calls" tally for 24-25:
Newcastle +9
Aston Villa +4
Brighton & Hove Albion +3
Crystal Palace +3
Tottenham +3
Manchester City +2
West Ham +2
Brentford +1
Fulham +1
Leicester +1
Wolves 0
Ipswich -1
Manchester United -1
Everton -2
Liverpool -2
Chelsea -3
Southampton -3
Nottm Forest -4
Arsenal -6
AFC Bournemouth -7
The bizarre standout number is for the Barcodes, not one of the traditional big teams, and the top two EPL finishers ranked deep in the bottom half. If there's evidence of a stacked deck in these numbers, I don't see it.
Also worth noting: The clubs that benefited the most from the 18 acknowledged/confirmed VAR errors were us and Brighton with three apiece. The errors that went our way were the Nørgaard red card, the goal against Wolves with Doucoure offside, and Tarks against the RS.
12 Posted 17/10/2025 at 17:22:06
Refs don't win trophies you narcissistic prick.
13 Posted 17/10/2025 at 17:23:08
https://www.liverpoolecho.co.uk/sport/football/football-news/mark-clattenburg-makes-major-everton-32691699#
14 Posted 17/10/2025 at 18:01:42
He faces 20+ years if convicted of wire fraud.
15 Posted 17/10/2025 at 19:15:43
Thanks for that, Kieran.
16 Posted 17/10/2025 at 19:18:08
Like it or not, Mike, the big teams get the big calls -- VAR or no VAR.
17 Posted 17/10/2025 at 19:20:31
Corrupt bastard.
18 Posted 17/10/2025 at 20:02:25
It's these comments that rankle:
“We talk about football understanding, if I had given this penalty and Everton had the chance to equalise, I would have got some criticism in the game but I wouldn't have got the huge criticism that I received. “Because by not awarding that penalty, in Everton's eyes, correctly… all the big decisions seemed to go against Everton and everything went in favour of Liverpool.”
He's talking about managing the outcome there. Managing the inevitable criticism and picking which one will cause him less trouble. That he acknowledges that he picked the wrong one isn't really any better or worse. He wasn't supposed to be picking at all -- he was supposed to judge things on their merits!
If anyone ever claimed that there isn't a clear refereeing advantage to the currently bigger, more newsworthy sides then they just need to read that again. Referees have a built-in bias towards whatever will cause them the least grief.
19 Posted 17/10/2025 at 22:54:29
His association with that Idiot at Forest and his RS holiday trip should tell you all you need to know.
20 Posted 17/10/2025 at 23:47:15
"The bizarre standout number is for the Barcodes, not one of the traditional big teams."
Not a traditional big team but definitely the richest, hmmmmm?
21 Posted 18/10/2025 at 00:21:19
He thought he was bigger than the game IMO and, as Jay points out, he went on pre-season tour with the RS.
22 Posted 18/10/2025 at 02:39:19
A link to Kieran's comment #14.
23 Posted 18/10/2025 at 03:37:01
My shithead so-called mate who's a Leeds fan told me of an article on their fan site entitled 'Will the turd finally be flushed?' I'd love to see Leeds go back where they came from just so I can tell him 'looks like the turd just changed colour to white'.
24 Posted 18/10/2025 at 09:56:48
There are many incidents that are passed over that are not included in this list. The latest example the pull on Ndiaye during the Palace game, an obvious penalty, seen by thousands, not mentioned during match commentary, match of the day highlights or ref watch.
25 Posted 18/10/2025 at 13:58:24
26 Posted 18/10/2025 at 14:20:23
27 Posted 18/10/2025 at 15:58:57
Mixed feelings, like seeing your mother-in-law drive your new Jag off a cliff!!
28 Posted 18/10/2025 at 23:00:58
I remember a fair few ToffeeWebbers beating the FA up cos of the "due diligence" being exercised over 777 Partners.
29 Posted 18/10/2025 at 23:05:11
He’s stood by some decisions (and clearly refuted the notion that Gerrard said something to him to influence him) and openly admitted two big errors that could have altered the outcome of the game.
He says he, inexplicably even to himself, just didn’t register the foul on Lescott, not that he made a judgment call on it at the time, and that he wrongly allowed a more senior colleague to make the call on Kuyt’s horrific lunge.
I’m no fan of the guy but this reads as a pretty sincere ‘mea culpa’ to me. He’s not agreeing with the Evertonian opinion on every decision but we now have the word of the referee himself that his errors cost us big time in that game.
Paul (23), who are ‘they’? Who thinks we are public enemy number one? That sounds like desiring victimhood in my opinion.
30 Posted 18/10/2025 at 23:05:57
I recall too. There were certain folks who must have been so desperate to get rid of Moshiri they averted their eyes to the obvious.
Ironically, we seem to be the only entity that made out well from dealing with 777 Partners -- I suspect because we were (they thought) the cash cow that could solve all their problems.
Instead, Masters saw through their bullshit, they bailed us out with dubious funds for a few months, we paid that money back to their creditors at a discount, and we found a legitimate owner instead. Worked out for us but could've have been disaster.
31 Posted 19/10/2025 at 07:45:20
32 Posted 19/10/2025 at 19:48:24
I can't stand any of them and they will never be forgiven.
33 Posted 19/10/2025 at 19:52:19
Add Robinson as I think he was the ref who cheated us at Wembley in The Milk Cup Final!!
34 Posted 19/10/2025 at 19:54:14
I'd add every baldy ref as well. None of them has ever given us a fair shake.
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1 Posted 17/10/2025 at 13:35:54
I can't stand him at all, pathetic and given too much TV time!