A referee has given us their perspective of refereeing and we think it gives you some thing to think about….
Who’d be a referee…..???
Imagine this scenario. You’ve spent hours planning your midweek training session which went well. You’ve gone over, and over again your game plan, team line up and have everything prepared.
The match kicks off and your losing the game. Your striker has just missed their 4th clear cut chance of a goal to get the match level. Suddenly, the referee turns around and shouts over to you for everyone to hear “why you playing this kid up front, he’s rubbish?”
The match carries on and your team has lost. At the end of the match, the referee comes over to you and in front of your players and their parents, questions your formation and tactics and blames you for the reason your team lost….completely undermining you as a manager.
It wouldn’t and doesn’t happen..
So why is it OK that the referee gets shouted at mid game or questioned about their decision making during the game and could be seen as the reason you may have not got the result you wanted or needed?
Yes. We may get it wrong sometimes.
Yes, our opinion of a situation may differ from yours. But remember, we are also looking at these incidents from a different angle to you whilst also trying to judge what is happening and also considering all the relevant rules. And we are doing this all whilst coaches, players and parents are shouting around us and under pressure.
We are not here to try and ruin your teams undefeated winning streak or to stop you winning for the first time in ages. We simply want to try and let the game run as smoothly as possible and with as little issue as possible.
Please remember, we are human too. We may have things affecting us outside of football, It could be a personal issue, doing exams, not feeling 100%, but for the love of the role we continue to help all the teams get the games going.
So please show us the same respect you would like us to show you and help us build better relationships between our officials and you.their
On January 24th 2024 we held our first ever Linesman Course presented by Alex James of Dorset FA.
108 people attended, representing 25 Clubs.
The course was “very informative, educational and the people running the course were friendly, engaging and very precise in the messages they were trying to get across.”
All in all a very worthwhile event, one which we hope to repeat in the future.
