On August 5th the FA introduced a Respect campaign in an attempt to, among other things, tackle the abuse that referee’s and officials get during (and often after) football matches. However, with the season in full flow officials are again receiving a huge amount of criticism from fans, players and coaching staff.
Yesterday Joe Kinnear, Newcastle United’s interim manager, was raging about the quality of referee Martin Atkinson after his side were beaten 2-1 at Craven Cottage. He called him a “Mickey Mouse” referee after the game claiming that Atkinson had failed to see, what Kinnear thought was, a foul on Newcastle defender Cacapa that led to Fulham winning a penalty, and thus the match.
Now i’m not suggesting whether he was right or wrong with his thoughts but merely the fact that the low quality of refereeing in general makes it difficult for people to abide by this ‘Respect’ campaign.
Just last month Habib Beye was wrongly sent off against Manchester City for a world-class challenge that resulted in a penalty for City. That red card was rescinded but what use is that after leaving the team with 10 men for the majority of the match.
Last week we saw Jason Roberts win a penalty for Blackburn that resulted from a minimal amount of contact and he thought it was a free-kick given against him. In the same match Benni McCarthy was also dismissed for two suspect offences.
The worst decision so far this season came in the Championship, at Vicarage Road, in September. At 0-0 a corner was played in by Reading and headed at goal ony for it to be deflected wide yet the linesman, rather bizzarely, awarded a goal. The game between Watford and Reading ended 2-2 but the decision was, quite possibly, the worst i’ve ever seen as the ball was at least a yard wide of the post.
As Howard Webb pointed out “we (referees) are only human” but with this in mind how can players, fans and managers accept decisions that cost their team points?
On Saturday I headed to Christie Park hoping to see my no-hopers Grimsby Town progress into the second round of the FA cup proper against Morecambe. I won’t bore you with all the particular details other than the fact that we got beat and the ref had a large say in this.
Now, there’s only a certain amount of blame that can be aimed at officials when teams get beat but when referees are so one-sided it’s hard not to cite that as a key reason. Regardless of how bad the players are.
I’ll start with Morecambe’s first goal: a Grimsby player was closing down on the right-hand side and the other player had his back turned, there was no contact but the player went down and a free-kick was awarded. Poor defending aside they scored.
The second goal was even worse: a blatant foul on a Grimsby player as we were pushing forward wasn’t given by referee David Webb and Morecambe went up the other end and 2-0 it was.
The game finished 2-1 and although it was a poor match, two bad decisions had lost the club a £20,000 win bonus and a place in the next round. To a team struggling financially that could’ve given a huge boost in finance, alongside what it would’ve meant for the players and supporters.
My point is that although the ‘Respect’ campaign is a good scheme in theory, in practice it has to work both ways. How can teams and their supporters respect the referee when they make bad decisions? Decisions that, potentially, make or break teams?
November 11th, 2008 at 12:14 am
The Watford incident was ridiculous, and you could say acted as a catalyst to Boothroyd’s sacking, albeit indirectly. Two extra points in that game could have proved a big difference in Watford’s season.
The Dundee-Partick goal incident from the Duncan Ferguson days is probably the worst decision I’ve ever seen: http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=xKuLtLXl7FI
November 12th, 2008 at 3:33 am
For the luvva gawd, it’s just a game. Where’s the real news?
November 12th, 2008 at 11:36 am
If you want to read the ‘real’ news then why are you reading a sports blog you muppet.
November 15th, 2008 at 7:11 pm
It’s very, very easy to criticise referees until you have actually got out there yourself and put on the dreaded black kit.
Howard Webb is spot on that referees are only human, and everyone makes mistakes.
I’d love to see a moaning manager like Joe Kinnear put his words to one side for a change, and referee a game; that would soon teach him just how hard it is to not be able to please every last soul at a game.
Referees are forced to make split decisions, under huge amounts of pressure, in a matter of milliseconds, with the knowledge that whatever option they choose, someone is going to disagree.
Football fans really need to start to acknowledge what a truly difficult job referees have; but with loud-mouth idiots like Joe Kinnear able to get away with branding one of the elite referees in the country as a “mickey mouse referee”, it will never fabricate.
RESPECT? As if.
November 16th, 2008 at 9:42 pm
I agree with you that it’s very easy to criticise and they’re often a scapegoat for a poor performance but my main point is that some of the decisions are simple and wrong.
The Respect campaign is, from what we’ve seen this season, impossible to implement.
Just yesterday Bolton had a legitimate goal chalked off for nothing…
Video referees anyone?
November 18th, 2008 at 2:16 pm
No decision is simple, at that stage, with that amount of pressure, every single one is a crunch decision.
Bringing in video referees would help the game immensely in some respects, but taking away the unpredictability of human error would do the beautiful game no favours at all, in my opinion.
The F.A. need to take a look at themselves and decide how seriously they are going to take the ‘RESPECT’ campaign; if they are going to try and advertise it, they need to back it wholeheartedly and punish ignorant managers like Kinnear.
As for the Bolton goal, Kevin Nolan was molesting Pepe Reina, the referee got the decision spot on if you ask me!
November 18th, 2008 at 2:39 pm
“Video referees anyone?”
Cameras every so many yards with slo-mo replay around the field’s perimeter may help to arbitrate disagreements.
November 18th, 2008 at 3:09 pm
The idea of video referees does seems daft to me as well but some of the shocking decisions I’ve seen in recent weeks makes me wonder if it could do any more harm to our beautiful game.
Having seen the Nolan incident a few times maybe there was a hint of a foul. Then again get up to St James’s and I don’t think Boyce will ever make as good a tackle as he did when he got sent off.
November 18th, 2008 at 9:10 pm
I just wonder how having ‘slo-mo’ replays will affect the continuity and flow of the game. Granted, it works well in sports such as Rugby; but football, without sounding cliche, is a totally different ball game.
I think the Boyce tackle was probably not worthy of a second yellow, but I can see where the referee was coming from. Boyce had been making silly tackles all day, and the way he went into the tackle looked as if it was retaliation from losing the ball moments earlier.
The referee probably sent the defender walking not because of the tackle itself, but for ‘consistent infringement’, the fact he had made a number of clumsy tackles in the build-up to the final straw.
November 19th, 2008 at 5:52 pm
Well, to refine the point FURTHER, the vid cams would be the final arbiter as they catch everything from multi-angles. Perhaps the ref could consult the linesmen or women in what they saw, come to a quick vote and if the disputed tackle wants to continue the vidcams would clarify in a similar fashion to a photo finish.
Of course, as Andy Halls appears to suggest, a player can be (rightly IMO) sent off or given a yellow/endorsement for constant infringement, or just constantly aggressive tackling I suppose?
Oops! :-$
My Bad!
*sheepish*
Further and farther
Webmaster you can delete the other one haha.
November 21st, 2008 at 2:38 pm
Jonty I presume you’re suggesting video refs like in rugby?
In all fairness I am sceptical about how useful that would be to our game but when you lose a match on a blatant mistake it’s ridiculous.
At the end of the day you can’t send someone off for ‘aggressive tackling’, it’s not tag-football. Aslong as you win the ball it’s a fair challenge.
Consistent infringement is obivously something you can get sent off for but my point was that Boyce made a brilliant tackle but still got sent off.
It’ll be hard to ever get to the bottom of how we can reduce mistakes. It’s probably not possible.
Look at rugby, for example, they have video refs yet some of the decisions are still contentious.
November 27th, 2008 at 3:24 am
Indeed.
Perhaps what I was driving at with ‘aggressive tackling’ should read more as ‘violent tackling’, like elbowing players in the face or stuff like that.