Ref Off!

Stray elbows, guns and brawls, yes folks it was just another week in British football. Okay let’s put this into context, the events of the last week or so are no precise representation of football in Britain. However these issues have created major talking points within the sport and gained considerable media attention. All of which presents the suitable argument at highlighting just how difficult it is for football officials to referee a match.

Naturally a football referee’s job is to oversee the game and try to help the match be contested in a fair and safe manner, and if possible allow the game to flow as smoothly for the players and in-turn the paying spectator looking to be entertained. But when a player in Wayne Rooney’s case decides that it is perfectly acceptable to needlessly use their elbow as a launched missile to strike against his opponent, should the officials be responsible for a player’s brutish behaviour and be held accountable for their premeditated wild mindset? Is that not the job of a manager?

Yet this is increasingly has becoming an additional feature that the individuals traditionally dressed in black are now having to tackle (pun intended). Why aren’t the managers taking accountability for their players’ actions? But more significantly, the players in the end are the only ones responsible for their own actions. Yet looking at it from the outside, it appears that they refuse to look at their conduct on and around the field of play. We see for large parts when games are being staged, players look to show descent and disrespect at any given opportunity to the official and make the game more complex to hold order.

Some like to pinpoint the fact that with the modern day footballer clasping such worldly benefits and riches, they have now become so far disconnected from the real-world and feel that there are untouchable. A feature that results in some of the bad behaviour we see sometimes on the field. That indeed may be debateable. But this notion is hard to dispel when a leading light in today’s game in the shape of Chelsea left-back Ashley Cole, feels that it is acceptable to bring an air rifle gun to the training ground.

Even though not a firearm, such a weapon retains the serious capacity to injure. Unfortunately for a young man on work experience at the Chelsea training facility, we are led to believe Ashley Cole allegedly shot this young man. Now the scene may be somewhat different and hard to compare but could most people in the working world dare bring such an instrument to their place of employment? And more importantly use it to a fellow colleague? Yet this is the breed of footballer the referees are due to officiate in matches.

Last midweek I watched the latest instalment of the never-ending story that is Old Firm clashes in this current season between Scottish giants Celtic and Rangers. In a Scottish Cup clash, it joined in on the act by creating its own bit of controversy. As a contest, the match was low on genuine football quality when measured to games held in the past between the two clubs, but this fixture was full of incident.

Now I won’t hide the fact that with a high-octane atmosphere, three players being sent off with three distinct occasions where the management and coaching staffed clashed in touchline fisticuffs, these episodes for me did made the match compelling viewing. However, I re-iterate how are referees and their assistants able to perform their duties to the best of their abilities, when the players make it impossible and behave like they did at Celtic Park.

Not to mention as positions of authority and symbols of responsible characters at their football clubs, the managers are tussling amongst themselves where the stewards and police had to get involved to restore the peace. Add a player in El Hadji Diouf who is no stranger to the unsavoury side of the sport, was fixed on making his only contribution to the tie by trying to antagonise as many people in the stadium as possible. Forgetting he would be more effective letting his feet do the talking and help gain a positive result for his Rangers team.

You only have to look at last summer’s World Cup final as an illustration of how difficult a job it is to officiate. In that final, referee Howard Webb at times had the thankless task of overseeing the showpiece event with players rounding him at every opportunity like a pack of hounds. When a player was being fouled or simulating injury both the Spanish and Dutch players would surround him and be in his ear demanding action. Not to mention Nigel De Jong showing to the world as his audience his Kung Fu prowess. And arguably this is the world’s best referee as judged by both UEFA and FIFA, with Webb officiating the game’s premier club competition in the UEFA Champions League Final, as well as football’s most important match, the FIFA World Cup Final.

It is quite interesting and coincidental that at a time when two other popular team sports are holding their respective big competitions, Rugby Union and its Six Nations tournament and the ICC’s Cricket World Cup. The players in both sports demonstrate ultimate respect for the official, and do not question their decision-making in the manner football does of its officials.

As a sport, football has progressively developed and has become so fast and super quick that it is inevitable that some decisions could be questionable. Particularly when in the main, a lot of the contentious moments are down to a referee’s personal interpretation. Presenting circumstances where some judgments may rightly go a team’s way and some that may not. It is just part of the game, part of sport, and an element of life.

I should add that this post was constructed before the events at the Nou Camp and the Champions League meeting between Barcelona and Arsenal, and with that I do acknowledge that a referee’s decision or lack of it at times can help tip the balance of the result to a particular team. In the extreme cases it can promptly be the cause of a particular result. However, a team has 90-plus minutes to directly influence their own destiny and the outcome they require. The official has now become a mere scapegoat for a team’s own shortcomings in not securing the win or wanted result.

As a football fan I think most would agree they do not want to see situations were every decision is queried by an outside influence, namely video replays. But as I have mentioned in previous posts the referees do need help and the powers that govern football should try to facilitate this as best they can. Which is why I am an advocate for goal-line technology, as this is an arguable instant that is a mater of fact. With the technology provided it can help solve the question did the whole match ball cross the goal line or not? Concluding with one less controversial decision that the referees have to make in a usually rash and uncertain fashion. Thus focusing their efforts in getting the other big decision right.

But to all the players, managers and fans, which are quick to get on the officials case after a match has concluded, isn’t it time that you should look at your own team’s personal conduct? In your post-match assessment take also into the consideration the on field output and ask yourselves the question, can it be categorically the case that the game was lost because of the official? Could we have performed better and taken our chances? Or simply was it just not our day today as opposed to the referee getting it wrong?