Data files
All files are static, public and need no access key. Missing values are empty (never 0).
JSON
/data/matchs.json— all matches, column-oriented (see the dictionary below)/data/arbitres/<slug>.json— a referee's matches and records by club (example :/data/arbitres/undiano-mallenco.json)/data/clubs/<slug>.json— a club's matches (example :/data/clubs/alaves.json)/data/paires/<arbitre>/<club>.json— matches of a referee × club pair/data/archives/saisons/<saison>.json,/data/archives/clubs/<slug>.json,/data/archives/arbitres/<slug>.json— archives/search-index-en.json,/search-index-es.json,/search-index-fr.json— search index (pages, referees, clubs, seasons)
CSV
/data/csv/matchs.csv— One match per row: date, season, period, matchday, teams, score, referee, cards, penalties, fouls, corners, shots, odds, with the source of each group of variables./data/csv/arbitres.csv— Referees: identifier, full name, variants found (with source), colegio, region, seasons, number of matches./data/csv/arbitre_club.csv— Each referee × club pair: record, points and expected points, balances, p-values, q-values and verdicts./data/csv/designations.csv— Appointment frequency: observed and expected matches per referee × club pair, p, q and reading./data/csv/periodes.csv— By club and period: points, expected points, raw and strength-adjusted measures with confidence intervals./data/csv/diff_in_diff.csv— The study's differences-in-differences, bootstrap intervals, p and q./data/csv/var_tests.csv— Effect of VAR: Liga averages before and after, permutation p./data/csv/var_saisons.csv— Liga averages per season (penalties, reds, yellows, fouls)./data/csv/calibration_cotes_saison.csv— Odds calibration: actual and expected points across the whole Liga per season./data/csv/titres.csv— Liga champion per season, with the source./data/csv/couverture.csv— Share of matches with data, by season and variable./data/csv/coherence.csv— Differences between recomputed and official standings./data/csv/conflits.csv— Disagreements between sources (score, referee) and the decision taken./data/csv/donnees_manquantes.csv— Log of missing data, by season, variable and reason./data/csv/historique_matchs.csv— Archives: matches of the seasons before the main database (score and, when known, date, referee, penalties, cards), with their source./data/csv/historique_classements.csv— Archives: official final standings of the seasons before the main database.
Text for language models
/llms.txt— summary in llms.txt format/llms-full.txt— full text of the key pages (English)/sitemap.xml— every indexable page, with its EN, ES and FR versions/index.md/studies.md/studies/negreira-case.md/studies/var.md/studies/odds.md/methodology.md/data.md/about.md/developers.md
Content negotiation: send Accept: text/markdown to the address of any of these pages to get its Markdown version directly (with a Link header to the canonical page); without that header, HTML is served.
Robots and AI: the robots.txt file declares Content-Signal: search=yes, ai-input=yes, ai-train=no. Search and AI answers that cite the site are welcome; model training is refused, because part of the data comes from a CC BY-NC (non-commercial) source.
Field dictionary
| Column | Description |
|---|---|
id | match identifier (season_home_away) |
s | season |
d | date (YYYY-MM-DD) |
j | matchday |
h | home club (identifier) |
a | away club |
hg | home club goals |
ag | away club goals |
r | referee (identifier) or empty |
ramb | 1 if one of the Teixeira Vitienes brothers, not told apart |
ph | probability of a home win (odds, margin removed) |
pd | probability of a draw |
pa | probability of an away win |
penh | penalties won by the home club |
pena | penalties won by the away club |
yh | yellow cards received at home |
ya | yellow cards received away |
rh | red cards received at home |
ra | red cards received away |
fh | fouls committed by the home club |
fa | fouls committed by the away club |
ch | home corners |
ca | away corners |
sh | home shots |
sa | away shots |
apenh | strength-adjusted penalties, home point of view (positive = favourable) |
apena | adjusted penalties, away point of view |
arh | adjusted reds, home point of view |
ara | adjusted reds, away point of view |
ayh | adjusted yellows, home point of view |
aya | adjusted yellows, away point of view |
afh | adjusted fouls, home point of view |
afa | adjusted fouls, away point of view |
Licences
Zenodo 7341037 (BeSoccer data): CC BY-NC 4.0 — attribution required, non-commercial use. Tables containing this data inherit these terms.
Wikipedia (en, es): CC BY-SA 4.0 — attribution, share-alike (references dated by revision in the source columns).
football-data.co.uk: scores, odds and match statistics. Credit: "Data from football-data.co.uk"; reuse subject to that site's terms.
Updates
Data is regenerated with every update of the analysis pipeline, with no fixed schedule. Last generated: 3 October 2026 (9,880 matches, 2000-01 → 2025-26).
How to cite
Page addresses are permanent. Cite the canonical URL and the data update date:
El Colegiado, "Data on refereeing in the Liga", https://elcolegiado.com/ (data updated on 3 October 2026).
El Colegiado. Liga refereeing data, 2000-01 → 2025-26, version of 3 October 2026. https://elcolegiado.com/data/
Every study and every profile page also has a "Cite this page" box.
Usage guidelines
- A statistical deviation is not proof: never present it as evidence of biased refereeing.
- Quote the q-value (corrected for multiple comparisons) rather than the raw p-value, and always the sample size.
- "Inconclusive" does not mean "no effect": referee × club pairs often involve few matches.
- Keep the vocabulary neutral: "favourable to the club", "unfavourable to the club", "inconclusive".
- Respect the source licences, in particular the non-commercial use of the BeSoccer data.