To answer the OP – that feels all kinds of wrong to me. I believe a school does find out how many students listed it first choice but not who they are.
@DEAROP it’s dangerous advice to list only one school. If your relative listed others, they would still get the allocated if listed as first choice, as evidently they qualified for a place. You are wrong to suggest that listing the school you were offered lower on your form would have stopped you getting a place – unless of course a place was available at your higher-pref schools.
I do see tho it’s hard to fight against people who say “I only listed one school and got that” – they see the result and assume causality but they are incorrect.
If you only list one school, and that a very popular school where you don’t qualify on distance (the main criterion as a rule) then the LA won’t allocate you that school anyway – it will allocate whatever school is left after all the people who listed multiple schools have had their go. So most likely that will be an unpopular school, potentially miles away.
That’s why it’s a good idea to list somewhere on the form the local school even if you are not keen; a 5-min walk to a less good school is better than a 45-min bus ride to one.
If you qualify for a place at your first choice, you will get it. Which is why you should always list your genuine first choice first, even it it is a very long shot.
I live nearish but out of catchment for v popular school A; if I had listed it first, then the local OK school B second, I would probably in my DCs’ years got school B. But if there were fewer applications for school A, then I might have got a place if I had listed it first. And doing that would not harm my chances of school B (which we are very close to).