A study in Germany finds that shorter football referees penalize bigger players more harshly. Apparently, this is how they impose authority and compensate for height
Someone would say that it is prejudice and that the matter is not politically correct, but the German researchers still dared. In one study, they claim that smaller soccer referees punish bigger soccer players more harshly.
It is, they say, a reflection of the "Napoleon complex" that sometimes leads shorter men to an excess of aggression with which they "compensate" for height, writes writes Deutsche says (DW).
However, one should be careful. A scientific paper that could raise dust is only there as a "preprint", so it is still waiting for comments and verification by the professional public.
Yellow cards are easy.
The thesis was questioned by scientists Hendrik Sonnabend and Giulio Callegaro from the University of Hagen and Mario Lackner from the "Johann Kepler" University in Linz.
Conveniently around the European Championship, they have published the results of their analysis of Bundesliga matches between 2014 and 2021. They watched 2.340 games.
They conclude that lower referees are easier on the whistle when a bigger player allegedly fouls - and it's easier to draw a yellow card.
"The tendency to punish a player more harshly is ten percent higher if that player is significantly larger than the referee, compared to the situation when they are of similar physical build," says Zonnabend.
Taller judges are kind to short players
According to the study, the alleged "Napoleon complex" comes to the fore especially in the first half of games.
"It is obvious that punishments are used to demonstrate authority." When it doesn't succeed with physical dominance, then punishments follow according to foreign currency - here you have to dance as I play," Zonabend believes.
He assumes that the harshness of sanctions in the second half of lower referees decreases because the players understand that the referee is harsh.
The "Napoleon Complex" theory is of course named after the French Emperor Napoleon Bonaparte and rests on a popular fallacy. Because, with his 169 centimeters, Napoleon was average or even above average height at that time.
But scientists have also found the reverse syndrome, so to speak - they claim that a bigger football referee is especially kind to shorter players. They punish them 16 percent less than footballers of their height.
Researchers report that body size brings a kind of relaxation.
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