How bad are referees?

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Is it just my imagination, or are the referees getting worse all the time? I watched the Arsenal vs Wolves game and the ref made so many bad decisions, I lost count. It seems in every game now they are giving red cards when they shouldn't and are not giving them when they should. How many recent penalty decisions have been wrong too? I know it is not an easy job, but I think if they actually played the game, they would understand it more. How many, if any top refs have ever played the game at any decent level?

Mike Selig wrote:Football fans, players and managers get the referees they deserve. Until they are treated with more respect and backed up by the FA, no one in their right mind will do it. Trust me, I've tried.

To compare with rugby refs (I still referee rugby matches), the last football match I refereed saw a player say to me (after I had given a throw-in against him, that's right, not really a game-changing decision was it?) "jeez ref, you are an effing special aren't you?". I promptly sent him off. The RC was promptly recinded on the basis that what he said wasn't really insulting. Now a rugby player once said to me "you should have gone to specsavers, you're effing Poopie" earned himself a red card, and duly got a 6-week ban. Spot the difference?

Of course, football refs are probably as good as they ever have been: they certainly make fewer errors than most of the players (anyone want to count the ammount of times your favourite player keeps the ball - the best passing rates are usually around 80% so there's a few mistakes right there). It's just the technology shows up their errors far more. Then of course, there's the commentators who seem keen to call any marginal decision as wrong, in order to stir up controversy. Couldn't believe the interview of Mancini after today's game, the commentator may just as well have said "clearly that wasn't a red card was it?".

Of course refs could be backed by better technology, but even then some people would moan. Take today's RC and not given PK to Man City: both were debateable, so using technology would only put the decision in someone else's hands...

completely agree mate

lorus59 wrote:Mike Selig.
I think you don't have much of a sense of humour. I would have had a lot more respect for you if you had swore back at him.

Seriously? You think calling someone a special or Poopie is funny? I don't give up my week-ends to get sworn at, so I stopped reffing football.

As I say, when fans are prepared to go to matches at exhorbitant prices so players can get paid exhorbitant amounts of money which makes them bigger than the game they play, and the same fans expect perfection from the guys in the middle (actually they don't expect perfection, they expect decisions to favour their side) and when they don't get it, think it's perfectly acceptable to call him a w@nker (or worse), whilst refusing to condemn their players and managers for the foul language and intimidation they use on referees, then all I can do is repeat: fans get the referees they deserve.

"Jason Roberts knows more about it than you nah nah naee nah nah!!"

I hate guys that fall behind that line....

Maybe he knows more than Peter Reid, Gareth Southgate and And Townsend too perhaps!!

Well yeah he does considering he is still an active player and will be aware of what referees expect of them in the modern game. That challenge was acceptable when the players you mentioned were still playing, it isn't now hence why Jason Roberts commented.

I will add as I have mentioned in previous posts I don't think it warranted a red card. The fact that nani (a player who will usually go to ground at will) started to track back immediately, proves this. The rules of football are getting beyond a joke now. Because players are getting paid so much and are so valuable, they're getting so much protection to avoid serious injury. I would never like to see a player with a broken leg, but on the opposite side I want to see players being allowed to tackle for the ball. At the end of the day football is a contact sport that seems to be becoming more non contact by the season and it's a joke, but for today's red card I blame the rules and not the referees

I actually said "good tackle" when Kompany won the ball. Replays did show that he lunged. But he lunged one-footed, he was hardly off the ground and it was only just about a foul. If the ref had been harsh, it was a foul, if he was extremely harsh it was a yellow card. A red card? Ridiculous.

What can you do? As a Liverpol fan I don't even check who the ref is any more becaue they are all simply terrible. It's now got to the stage where all you can do is hope they don't make a shamble's of the game your watching (like that idiot did yesterday) As I said earlier when Howard Webb is considered the best ref you have then you know you have got a big problem with the standard of refereeing. Surely in this day and age they can invent robot's with more common sense than the ref's in the prem.

Refs are not terrible. They are enforcing an awful set of rules. Sure, they make mistakes, but who doesnt.

The FA need to address the fact that football is becoming similar to basketball.

Deliberate cheating needs to be punished. Zamora at Fulham and Modric at Wolves (I think) are 2 recent examples of shameful diving.

Then you have the Norwich lad who was 'headbutted' by Barton... and his manager has the cheek to say he isnt a cheat... and the FA wont entertain an appeal. It really is appalling stuff.

johnson2 wrote:Refs are not terrible. They are enforcing an awful set of rules. Sure, they make mistakes, but who doesnt.

The FA need to address the fact that football is becoming similar to basketball.

Deliberate cheating needs to be punished. Zamora at Fulham and Modric at Wolves (I think) are 2 recent examples of shameful diving.

Then you have the Norwich lad who was 'headbutted' by Barton... and his manager has the cheek to say he isnt a cheat... and the FA wont entertain an appeal. It really is appalling stuff.

I agree about the diving but that could have been stopped age's ago by handing out ban's after the game's but the f.a CHOOSE not to stamp it out so it's their own fault. Imo every single ref in the league is incompetent they do have a hard job but the error's that are made evey week are laughable, and then you have sky and Dermott Gallagher trying to defend them on mon morning's.

as a united fan i will say kompany was a clear red card, ha ha had all the city fans fuming anyway. foy had a bit of a shocker realy, you wont see a clearer penatly than valencia in second half but either the ref didnt have the balls to give two pens or he was evening it up who knows, but poor refering all round.

as you refs in general, ive always been a football fan but played rugby so have to agree with mike selig post, got to start repecting them more. the amount of times i see commentaters taking up to 8-9 replays to make a decesion on something and then slag of the ref for getting it wrong. the refs will make mistakes, just like a keeper will let a howler in and a defender scores a o.g its all part of the game. always has been and always will be. as to the refs in this league i feel they are much better than the other leagues.

my only real gripe would be this whole "there was contact so its a foul", since when did touching someone become a foul? we see it all the time, the most minimum of contacts in the box the player throws himself over so its a pen? since when is this a foul, we need to be clearer and state the difference between contact and impeading a player. and all these players who go down so easy dont give a pen, it will soon stop this form of cheating. the only real hard bit is a ankle tap where the slightest of taps can knock you off balance

If players weren't such bloody cheats there wouldn't be so much criticism of the refs.

Well said Mike Selig! Nice to see a bit of common sense on the subject.

We must all accept that referees are human and will make mistakes from time to time...even the odd howler. You might think something is obvious from 50 yards away in the stands, with an elevated view to make things clearer, but it might not look as clear at ground level, with a bunch of players impeding your vision.

Refereeing is a hard enough job without players cheating / simulating / trying to con the ref into giving cards, penalties and free kicks.

Until players start repecting the REFS, the OPPOSING PLAYERS and the RULES and SPIRIT of the game they are paid so handsomely to play, things will not change.

When footballers start acting like rugby players (a few recent gaffes aside) then I will start repecting them as sportsmen. Until then I will continue to view the majority of them as spoilt, petulant children who deserve to go and stand in the naughty corner.

Of course the managers and to a lesser extent, the fans, need to start showing officials more respect too, (don't think I've ever seen a rugby manager sent off for arguing, or heard rugby fans chant "the referee's a w***er"), but it is the players who have the most direct influence on the decisions that are made.

It is up to them to help the refs do their job properly...If they did, we might start seeing better decisions made more often. We might even see more physical, free-flowing football, as the FA would not feel the need to introduce new regulations every season to further restrict what players are allowed to do.

I'm a season ticket holder for Bristol City, now in the championship I would expect to see a bad referee every so often. Or at least a referee (I should say) who is getting the calls wrong by bad decision making. However watching the games this season, some of the refereeing has been laughable.

The main thing I would put this down to is the inconsistency of the refereeing that we see today. One week there will be a referee who will attempt to let play go and barely blow his whistle for anything, including hard challenges, climbing on players to win headers etc. Then the next week you will see a referee who will blow his whistle for even a slight shoulder barge. And this is where I think some of the disrespect for referees comes from because the refereeing is so inconsistent players don't know what is a foul or not half the time anymore, and players seem now to be more bandaged by the 'rules' now than even 5 years ago, let alone when people say '15 years ago that tackle would have been applauded rather than a booking'.

What good woudl swearing back do? Just lowering yourself to the level of the player. A ref is supposed to be in control and someone who is looked at as the law on the pitch.

This happens in Rugby. Players refer to the ref as Sir and do as their told. Lets face it, if a rugby player wanted to get in your face he would have no problem over-powering the ref! But he doesnt out of respect, even when he thinks the decision is questionable. Doesnt always happen as Mike Selig pointed out above but then the player is disciplined and rightly so.

I also have a LOT of respect for a ref who uses his cards to do the talking rather than his mouth. Telling players to f*** off and shut the f*** up is not going to help anything. It will just make the situation worse and loosen the refs grip on the game. If a ref swears back at you an already peed off player isnt going to sit back and be quiet! Especially when football players generally see themselves as being above the ref anyway and all decisions he makes are instantly questionable. Ashamed to say i've been there myself when i used to play!

Football needs to look at the rugby way of refeering a match. Football has really started to bore me over the past few years (since Ronaldos mega money move to Real tbh) as it has become so money based. I'm sure the disrespect for the ref is a by-product of this. Would LOVE to see a match where the ref dished out yellows for anyone approaching him in an aggressive manner or hurling insults at him. But its the only way it will stop.

Funnily enough, i've been watching Rugby a lot more over the last few years and even started playing for the first time ever! Its amazing how different it is on a Rugby pitch and not just because of the posts.

EDIT: Damn dyrewolfe pretty much beat me to all my points...and in a much more condensed way! Haha!

longrangeeffort wrote:
Football needs to look at the rugby way of refeering a match. Football has really started to bore me over the past few years (since Ronaldos mega money move to Real tbh) as it has become so money based. I'm sure the disrespect for the ref is a by-product of this. Would LOVE to see a match where the ref dished out yellows for anyone approaching him in an aggressive manner or hurling insults at him. But its the only way it will stop.

Funnily enough, i've been watching Rugby a lot more over the last few years and even started playing for the first time ever! Its amazing how different it is on a Rugby pitch and not just because of the posts.

I agree. Unfortunately the ref who does as you suggest is unlikely to ever referee a high profile match again, as the authorities don't back the refs to the extent they could/should.

Another good point (or two there). As with a few other sports, the regulations could do with clarifying, on exactly what constitutes a foul, while being written in such as way that there is sufficient leeway for refs to make sensible decisions...without feeling they have to ignore them completely and rely on their own judgements (hence the inconsistency hodge referred to).

The FA and the rulemakers have a fair bit to answer for as well.

Continuing the rugby comparisons, I would LOVE to see sin-binning introduced to football. I'd be willing to bet you'd see a rapid and drastic improvement in behaviour, if teams were reduced to 10 men for 10 minutes, each time a serious foul was committed.

I'd use sin-binning in place of yellow cards. Sounds draconian I know, but something drastic needs to be done to cut down the amount of cheating that goes on.

Of course, if it were me, I'd also introduce a cricket-style TV umpire who could tell the ref if he thought it was a genuine mistake, caused by bad timing or poor pitch conditions, or if there was genuine intent to commit a foul.

Yet another part of the problem IMO is that football is still in the dark ages, technologically, compared to many other sports. As well as goal line technology, the simple addition of TV replays, either viewable by the ref, or studied by another official, would help eliminate a large number of poor decisions...and you don't see cricket or rugby fans complaining about it ruining the game.

have to say im usually on the ref's side, however in the palace, cardiff game last night, the ref was awful...think it was mike dean....

One thing I don't understand though is why are referees allowed to be punished/ downgraded retrospectively after seeing endless replays of any mistake but not players?

sportsville wrote:One thing I don't understand though is why are referees allowed to be punished/ downgraded retrospectively after seeing endless replays of any mistake but not players?

Because the FA are fools.

Dyer should be given a punishment for his dive yesterday, conned the ref. If the FA start dishing out punishments for the blatant cheating that goes on week in, week out then it would sharp stamp it out.

johnson2 wrote:
Because the FA are fools.

Dyer should be given a punishment for his dive yesterday, conned the ref. If the FA start dishing out punishments for the blatant cheating that goes on week in, week out then it would sharp stamp it out.

Suspensions for players and points penalties for clubs would put a stop to most of the conning the ref in about 2 weeks. It just needs the FA and FIFA to have the backbone to actually carry through the threatened punishments.

cricketfan90 wrote:have to say im usually on the ref's side, however in the palace, cardiff game last night, the ref was awful...think it was mike dean....

As a Palace season ticket holder I saw Dean as the ref in the program and thought great should get a nice flowing game this evening but alas he was clueless.

As previously mentioned some of the refs in the championship are poor. It's the lack of consistantcy and the fact they seem to be intimidated by players. For me the worst one is when the ref marks the 10 yards for the wall for a free kick- the players (including Palace) never budge- I say sling them in the book rather than just give up on it. Same goes for freekicks and throw ins when the players gains an extra 5 yards by rolling the ball forward.

If anyone saw Scannell's red card for 2 yellows against Leeds this weekend- please explain to me because that was the softest dismissal I have ever seen

Another great demonstration of how bad referees are with Webb's performance at Stamford Bridge.

lorus59 wrote:Another great demonstration of how bad referees are with Webb's performance at Stamford Bridge.

Yes I agree. Man Utd should have had at least another penalty.

He should have given a free-kick to Man U for the Cahill foul, yes (possibly a red card). But the 2 he gave were of the Andrex soft variety.

The first was a blatant penalty with even AVB concluding it was the right decision, but don't let that ruin a good moan for you

It depends? if you are a Man United fan. Howard Webb is a god...

Nay Bother wrote:The first was a blatant penalty with even AVB concluding it was the right decision, but don't let that ruin a good moan for you

First was a shocker from Sturridge, the second was awful though was as bad as Johnsons dive yesterday. Welbeck actually kicked Ivanovic and got a penalty for it

hampo171 wrote:First was a shocker from Sturridge, the second was awful though was as bad as Johnsons dive yesterday.

Talking of diving the BBC football web page has the strange headline "Pulis wants PFA to act on play-acting."

Both were penalties, it was naivety as well as stupidity for Ivanovic to stick his leg, was asking for trouble.

I see that Stuart Attwell has been demoted to lower leagues because of too many mistakes. Is it ok to make mistakes in the lower leagues? No one cares about them right?

"The man who was once China's top football referee has been sentenced to five-and-a-half years in jail for taking bribes to fix matches. Lu Jun - who officiated at the World Cup - was one of nine people convicted of charges related to corruption inside Chinese football." http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-china-17054150

Considering the amount of money in the game, and the relative peanuts that officials are paid, it has always concerned me that 50-50 decisions or even 20-80 decisions might be dependent on "sweeteners".

lorus59 wrote:I see that Stuart Attwell has been demoted to lower leagues because of too many mistakes. Is it ok to make mistakes in the lower leagues? No one cares about them right?

It depends on how much the manager's whinge about them.

Time to reopen this can of worms I think. I wonder what Martin Atkinson is thinking sitting at home now after watching the highlights (if he does)? If a person in any other profession made such a huge mistake what would the consequences be?