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Refereeing question

In 35 years as a referee and many years assessing and mentoring I thought I had seen everything. How wrong could I have been.

I have never seen or heard of a player high fiving a referee. :icon_lol: I hope the referee took it in the spirit it was intended.
Yeah he was a decent chap, took no nonsense but was up for a bit of a laugh where the situation allowed, if only they all could be like that!
 
As you all know Micro is now SIX YEARS into his junior football career. That is scary!

I have only seen a manager of his lose it to an unacceptable degree once. And it was bad. The poor bloke was about 17 and he had refereed the match pretty well, but got one decision badly wrong, and it did result in costing our team a goal. I cannot remember the exact circumstances now but that isn't important. Our manager had lost it. All the parents on the sideline could see it, but we aren't in a position to intervene with the manager on the other side of the pitch.

He abused this poor kid awfully, and thankfully the referee was confident and brave enough to send him off. Totally deserved. His dad was there as well, as often happens at the kids level, and he was on the other side of the pitch with us. He obviously would have assisted the referee in making his report, and all we could do as the parents was to give our apologies and hopes that it would not discourage his son from continuing his refereeing.

The manager was fined. The club was fined. The club board made him pay both fines before he was allowed in the dug out again.
 
There is a big problem in youth football. And as Paddys story shows, it is not the children that is the problem, but the parents. The last time I watched a youth game, the referee was constantly being abused by parents, and some parents were screaming and shouting at the players.

I don't know about other areas, but now in Leicestershire at youth games, supporters have to stand at the side of the pitch, with different teams supporters on either side of the pitch. All clubs in the Leicestershire youth league have had delegate one person who is responsible for ensuring the players and the referee are shown due respect. And so far the scheme has worked quite well.
 
There is a big problem in youth football. And as Paddys story shows, it is not the children that is the problem, but the parents. The last time I watched a youth game, the referee was constantly being abused by parents, and some parents were screaming and shouting at the players.

I don't know about other areas, but now in Leicestershire at youth games, supporters have to stand at the side of the pitch, with different teams supporters on either side of the pitch. All clubs in the Leicestershire youth league have had delegate one person who is responsible for ensuring the players and the referee are shown due respect. And so far the scheme has worked quite well.

Ths is the case in the main youth league in Southampton for 6-10 year olds, and I agree this works very well. If there are any issues that person is designated to handle it but equally if another parent has an issue rather than vent it at the ref, a player or fellow spectator they can come and speak to this person.

I am perhaps fortunate but in three years in Southampton I have not had any bad experiences on this side in mini-soccer, compared to East London which is a different issue entirely. The league the u8s I coach also do not appoint referees, the teams have to supply a referee (ie. a coach or parent) to referee a half of the game each. Results aren't recorded (no league tables until 12) so that aspect doesn't matter in terms of ref's influencing results and people I think are less likely to give a parent grief as a ref as it means they have stepped up where others haven't. Why people do not use that same logic with referees I can not understand.

At u18s equally while I have come across some bellend coaches thinking they are working in pro football, the way they talk with the referee has generally been pretty fine, much to my amazement.

Come to senior football in the Wessex league (level 9 football) and the abuse the referees get is frankly disgusting (our own manager included really). I am stunned really and the only way for it to change is to do what the FA are doing now I think. The more assessors/ senior referees we can get watching games (to stop the abuse of power that may swing in the official's way) the better too. Not least as someone the managers can talk to if they have a problem rather than shouting profanities at the man in the middle when all that is doing is making it worse!
 
About the same issues in sweden as well..parents getting to involved screaming at the ref and the kids too..
 
Around here we have managers and coaches one side of the pitch and all the parents together on the other side. But there has to be a respect barrier and you aren't allowed to encroach beyond that.

I actually just remembered one other story. When Micro was 9 we had one player on the team (he shall remain nameless) who now is in Albion's academy and it looks like he has a VERY good chance of making it. The game was over Oldbury way, and the young lad (who scored something like 55 goals that season) was taking the piss out of the opposition with his skills, and some kid when straight into him knee high. He got up and pushed the kid who had fouled him over. Obviously naughty.

However, the transgressor's father jumped the respect barrier and threatened to lump our NINE YEAR OLD player. All hell looked like breaking loose.

We have never played that team since. We refused the fixture.
 
I'm our clubs Welfare Officer and Secretary. The respect barrier or at least a roped off area is mandatory as is one supporter wearing the respect yellow tabard. Whether little Jimmy's mum is going to stop little Johnny's dad acting like a prick is unlikely though. My experience is Summer tournaments are the worst as they aren't under the jurisdiction of a local FA sanctioned league. I saw two managers square up this year and the 15 yr old referee understandably lost as to what to do.
 
Having read through the match day thread yesterday..it had a new red card(or several) on each page posted by WH..have the refs had new orders or something, have you heard anything Frank?
 
Having read through the match day thread yesterday..it had a new red card(or several) on each page posted by WH..have the refs had new orders or something, have you heard anything Frank?

There have been no new directives given to referees, but I think most new seasons start with quite a few red cards. Referees are expected to apply the laws of the game correctly, and with everything fresh in their minds, they do tend to be a bit stricter than when the season is in full flow.
 
i was just saying there were more red cards than ever i think in a lot of leagues in UK, so had to ask if i had missed something

I wasn't replying to your point, just putting a video out there which I'd seen
 
Just bringing refereeing talk from the live match thread.

Referees do make mistakes Frank i agree but i think they are poor these days compared to what they should be. I know replays make it easier to criticise them but i think a lot of them get simple decisions wrong that replays aren't needed for. Maybe it's because they are under more pressure these days i don't know.
 
I would not argue that referees make mistakes, and yes some of them are game changing mistakes, but believe me there is a lot of work being put into mentoring and assessing referees from level seven to level one. We want referees to put in as complete a performance as they can.

In most cases the assessors mark the referee lower than the clubs, which is down to the strict guidelines the assessors have to abide to. Referees do not reach football league level by accident, they do so because of their level of performance.
 
Do you not think though Frank that referees aren't getting better when in reality they should be. I don't whether it's just because what is fresh in my mind but i just think they are worse than referees from 10-15 years ago. Same goes for cricket, i know we have DRS in that now but umpires seem poorer and to give more poor decisions.

I think that's my main problem is refs seem to give more bad decisions these days than they used to but do admit that may just be down to my own perception.
 
Do you not think though Frank that referees aren't getting better when in reality they should be. I don't whether it's just because what is fresh in my mind but i just think they are worse than referees from 10-15 years ago. Same goes for cricket, i know we have DRS in that now but umpires seem poorer and to give more poor decisions.

I think that's my main problem is refs seem to give more bad decisions these days than they used to but do admit that may just be down to my own perception.

I think it goes down in many sports the same..here in sweden many refs gets screamed at on a regular basis and even threatened by supporters..so I think if they had a safe environment to develop their game without that shit they would improve aswell...cameras can help, because supporters will accept them easier than a refs call sadly..all this is not glamorous and will get fewer people to choose to be a ref and fewer people equals lesser standard..at least thats my view
 
I am not sure that the umpire correlation is fair. We had a succession of absolutely superb umpires. Taufel was probably the last. Maybe these things are cyclical and we are due some great cricket umpires soon.

Same as rugby - there are great refs but they aren't as brilliant as Clive Norling or Derek Bevan were.
 
Despite the criticism that Mike Dean is getting following the Bournemouth v Manchester City game, he was correct to show Sterling a second yellow card. The laws state that players must be cautioned if they "approach the spectators in a manner which can cause safety and/or security issues".

And given that stewards were trying to keep the fans from spilling onto the pitch, I would suggest that Sterling acted in a way that could have caused safety issues.

Though it is fair to say that some referees would not have taken the stance that Mike Dean did.
 
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