Scottish Refs Voted to Strike

[finnster01]

Great,
I wish our Prem lot would do the same. It would be fantastic to have a weekend without Phil Dowd, Mike Riley, Howard Webb and the rest of the biased bunch. Bring in some Sunday leaguers. Can't be any worse than the current lot.

Who knows, maybe they even understand the offside rule? 

[sipwell]

Offside of course being the reason why linesmen are there  :022:

Seriously though: the referees should go on strike as long as they cannot make use of technical aids.

Recently I have been doing a "bit" of "referee" work myself in the amateur league of amateurs (the lowest of the lowest basically) in an indoor football competition (futsal). It is staggering how hard it is (even there) with two teams constantly nagging about every decision you take. I hand out more yellow cards for nagging than for anything else. Even so, most decisions are debatable in any case. Have you ever tried yourself to go out on a pitch and blow the whistle?

[HatterDon]

In all seriousness, unless the league and the PFA get this feces assembled and control the players, this may well happen in England as well. As I understand it, the strike is down to players hectoring a linesman to excess, followed by threats of GBH and even death until he resigned.

Who'd be a referee under those circumstances?

[duffbeer]

Offside of course being the reason why linesmen are there  :022:

Seriously though: the referees should go on strike as long as they cannot make use of technical aids.

Recently I have been doing a "bit" of "referee" work myself in the amateur league of amateurs (the lowest of the lowest basically) in an indoor football competition (futsal). It is staggering how hard it is (even there) with two teams constantly nagging about every decision you take. I hand out more yellow cards for nagging than for anything else. Even so, most decisions are debatable in any case. Have you ever tried yourself to go out on a pitch and blow the whistle?

Embarassed to admit this but I've been the linesman when all I have to do is call the ball out and point the flag in the right direction.  I struggle to do that correctly, but I get the calls perfect when I'm watching Fulham

[Burt]

Offside of course being the reason why linesmen are there  :022:

Seriously though: the referees should go on strike as long as they cannot make use of technical aids.

Recently I have been doing a "bit" of "referee" work myself in the amateur league of amateurs (the lowest of the lowest basically) in an indoor football competition (futsal). It is staggering how hard it is (even there) with two teams constantly nagging about every decision you take. I hand out more yellow cards for nagging than for anything else. Even so, most decisions are debatable in any case. Have you ever tried yourself to go out on a pitch and blow the whistle?

I did this in a tournament last year Mr Sipwell sir and wholeheartedly agree, a thankless task.

[sipwell]

I used to play Team Handball (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Team_handball) and the rules were very clear: no nagging! Whether you liked it or not, the referee was always right. It actually led to a system where you felt bad when a referee made a bad call and you actually admitted the ball crossed the line or you made a fault on your adversary. The game as a result was considerably more pleasant both for the referee and for the players. It feels good to know that both you and your opponent can admit that a referee is only a human too.

In football they raise their hand even if they know perfectly well they kicked it out. They also fall flat on their arses whenever they feel like a cheap penalty or free kick is the best they can get (Just watched all of MOTD, it looks like 90 % of the strikers have a falling disease. And peculiarly, it is all within a box marked by white lines close to the goalkeeper of their adversary). If it were Team Handball, you'll get a yellow card for that, a 2 minutes penalty the second time and a red card the third.  

[finnster01]

Referees are scum.  :red:

[Logicalman]

......and the rules were very clear: no nagging! Whether you liked it or not, the referee was always right.

.. somewhat like Rugby then. You talk back to the ref more than once, and it's a very lonely bath for you, son.

[sipwell]

......and the rules were very clear: no nagging! Whether you liked it or not, the referee was always right.

.. somewhat like Rugby then. You talk back to the ref more than once, and it's a very lonely bath for you, son.

Indeed. If you had a question for the ref, you equally had to address him with Sir or Madam. If your question involved nagging or debating the referee's decision, you would get a look and a yellow card.

There was no influencing of the referee. How often don't you see on a football pitch that a player is almost physically ON the referee to lobby or influence his decision.

There was, in this light, a great story in the Daily Telegraph of 17 October. The son of George Harris, an Ipswich Town keeper, sent in a letter to talk about the fairplay of his father. In the game Ipswich Town vs. London Caledonians on Eastern Monday 1925, Harris had to take a penalty. As he was convinced the penalty was wrongly awarded, he kicked the ball very softly towards the goakeeper of London Caledonians. As the keeper of London Caledonians was convinced the penalty was fairly awarded, he let the soft kick pass. The ball rolled into the goal extremely slow and everyone was watching whether it would actually make the goal line or not. That is what football should be ;-)

[cebu]

Actually, you don't have to look that far back in football history. In the 1960's the ref consulted a player (I think it was Terry Venables) whether his shot hit the back of the net or the stanchion beside the post before ricocheting back into play. Venables admitted it hit the stanchion, so no goal was given. Couldn't happen these days, eh?

[Lighthouse]

I too have a confession. Many years ago I ran the line in a Sunday League Game. In those days the rules were simple enough. So when a team appealed for offside I waved it away. The decision caused a few chuckles even by the ref. Not only had I missed an clear offside but I now realise I was thinking of my Sunday Dinner of Beef and lashings of gravy and Roast Potatoes and .......

The hardest thing is actually to concentrate for 45 minutes at a time while having great periods of doing nothing except run up and down one half of a pitch. I don't remember much about the game but there were lots of trees around the ground and the clouds were billowing across the....oh bugger I think I missed a blatant handball as well.

Not easy.

[sw9white]

Totally agree with the refs...

I come from a sporting background growing up playing both codes of rugby and football...

In rugby league and union you'd be sent off an suspended for touching the refs and getting in their face the way the players do in football. Personally I think it's a disgrace the way players are aloud to intimidate and handle a referee, and the messages it sends to players in lower levels of the game down to the juniors.

Well done to the ref's in Scotland, we know FIFA will sit on their asses as usual and allow the player abuse to continue and let the refs continue to be sitting ducks with refusing to use simple technology that wont runin the flow of the game.

[HatterDon]

Actually, you don't have to look that far back in football history. In the 1960's the ref consulted a player (I think it was Terry Venables) whether his shot hit the back of the net or the staunchion beside the post before ricocheting back into play. Venables admitted it hit the staunchion, so no goal was given. Couldn't happen these days, eh?

I'm pretty sure that was Franny Lee with Man City. He was celebrated far and wide for his sportsmanship. A few weeks later, he turned to another ref and, once again, said in all honesty that a goal just awarded to an opponent never crossed the line. He was booked, and another lesson in "no good deed goes unpunished" was learned.

[epsomraver]

All this surrounding the ref nonsense was supposed to have been stopped and only the captain allowed to approach the ref, the Manure days of chasing and hounding the ref were supposed to be all in the past, same as players leaping in the crowd to celebrate, Fifa being bribe free, I made the last bit up.

[HatterDon]

Just saw on SSN that Iceland's FA had agreed to supply their referees for this weekends matches, but the refs' association voted NOT to be strike breakers.