Referees are facing relative extinction but how can we solve this?

Repetitive, tolerated abuse should never be part of a job description.

I want to begin this piece with some context.

I am a referee. I qualified in 2019, and have thoroughly enjoyed the experience in junior and adult levels. I am in no way describing any personal experiences which affect me in an overwhelmingly negative way. It’s fine, I’m okay.

Since moving from Herefordshire to Wales, I’ve continued to use the hobby of refereeing not only to earn myself a bit of extra cash but to continue my love for the beautiful game in angles many fail to tread during their lifetimes.

Football is my life, and I want to be a part of it. It all seems like a perfect fit until I cross the line onto the hallowed turf.

I use the first person here, but I’m sure this is true for referees across the country.

In Herefordshire alone, referees are down by 18% from last year. This not only instigates a feeling of impartiality in club matches at lower levels, which can lead to further aggression, bias and even violence, but a lack of qualified presence whom can help control a game of passion and emotion.

So, from a refereeing perspective, I’d like to decipher why there is a national shortage, why the torrent of abuse is tolerated, and how this can be evolved at amateur and professional levels.

The mind and how it is influenced by external factors play a key role in officiating. A referee cannot be seen as partial in the interest of fair play.

This week, I refereed a match that finished 13-1. There were two fights, a red card, and two penalties, both for the winning side.

Of course, controversy ensued. Players from each side surrounded me, saying I was clueless, pulling my shirt, although this was not aggressive and purely a demonstration of a foul that one had apparently committed, and turned each decision into a constant debate.

I repeated, constantly that ‘I can only give what I see.’ What failed to hit home with the players is that everything was my decision, whether it was to the detriment or success of their side.

I know players are there to win and are even told to influence the referee’s psyche. This part doesn’t faze me, it’s what they have learned, copied and championed from external influences.

In 2019, Dr. Dara Mojtahedi wrote:

“Players and spectators often engage in abusive behaviour in part due to what’s known as “in-game triggers”. These can be frustrations towards a decision they believe to be unfair or as a method of externalising their problems in the game.  Many people also use interpersonal conflict with the referee in an attempt to influence future refereeing decisions.

“Such abuse is frequently demonstrated by players and managers at the highest level of football, who often face little consequences for their actions.  As a result, these actions are seen as acceptable conduct by viewers and spectators and it normalises the behaviour as an integral part of football. This allows players and spectators to emulate the actions in future matches with little consideration of the moral implications.”

Dr Mojtahedi’s project, when I came across it for research for this piece, fitted the narrative that I had created in my head perfectly. They do it because it is what they see.

Take the current petrol and diesel crisis, for example. Some, after seeing the panic spread across the nation via the news, have decided to overly stockpile, leaving the nation with even more shortage.

It can be applied to football too.

“Children, teenagers and even adults frequently try to imitate the mannerisms of their favourite footballers, be it copying their hairstyles or their skills when playing the game.  One reason for this copycat behaviour is what social psychologists refer to as “vicarious reinforcement”. This is the act of imitating another person, in an attempt to reap the same rewards as them.

“Now ask yourself, what would be going through an amateur player’s mind when they witness a successful footballer they look up to shouting at the referee for giving a decision against their team.”

This happened on multiple occasions to me in my example. I am of the belief that refereeing at a lower level carries more responsibility in terms of the duties that need to be carried out, and the tools in which you can complete them with are considerably less easy to use.

The playing fields were marked so shockingly that, even if I wasn’t 100% sure on a ball going out, I had to make a decision in my mind to translate to the men on the field. The substitutes who were supposed to be helping on the line didn’t, and with players constantly aiming to run in behind, it was my responsibility to judge it.

Now again, I’m no victim, I am paid to do the job. However, players need to take away to understand that referees at a certain level are under significant pressure with decisions that they should never have to make.

I wasn’t taught to be able to see an offside from a horizontal perspective, and if anyone can consistently, they’re a borderline miracle worker. It, honestly, was mostly educated guesses based on when the players began to run in behind.

When defending players then asked for me to justify my decision, I again said ‘I only give what I see’. That’s all I could do, and in any of these situations, I could have been wrong.

These situations could lead to the players losing a level of conduct and respect, resorting to dissent.

One mode of attempting to limit dissent came in my previous county, of which I really admired. Whenever a player was overzealous in their debate, they could have been sin-binned for a certain period of time.

Not only did it give the referee another level of authority, but an opportunity for the player to regather themselves and their mental state to return to the field. For this reason, it would help further than just brandishing a yellow card in a hapless argument, which neither side can win.

Another was giving recently qualified or young referees a purple shirt in junior football. Again, I found that when wearing this, the abuse I received was minimal, in fact, parents were kind and controlled when discussing decisions despite their emanating frustration.

This just wouldn’t work long-term in adult football though. It could be seen as a sign of weakness within a referee, to be worked on by both sides in order to gain an advantage.

For me, none of this is a problem. Again, I’m just recounting a tale that could help others.

In an age where mental health continues to rise in prominence, there is simply no chance that I would encourage anyone to referee. It’s a way of being closer to the beautiful game, but the price is there to be seen. On the television, or in the wild playing fields on a Sunday morning.

Going back to Dr Mojtahedi’s excellent thesis, what would you expect? It’s vicarious reinforcement.

Especially in another setting, the tone in which I would be speaking to these men would be different.

At 19, I was the junior of the vast majority playing on the day. Why, in any other setting, would these men be interested in the opinion, let alone be dictated to by a lad who was not only younger, but smaller than them.

My date of birth brought another factor which played against me on the day, and another reason why some players would have struggled to respect me in a way they would a senior.

I wouldn’t want to repeat the expletives thrown at me on the day from both sides. Despite its complete lack of impact on some, it is unacceptable.

Why is there a refereeing shortage in this country?  No matter how much money you give someone, they will refute from being regularly called a ‘c**t’ eventually. Even with the power of a yellow card.

However, I found that after my game finished, both sides were respectful, they shook my hand, said ‘thanks ref’, and walked off. Even the skipper of the 13-1 losers on the day was gracious.

This made me feel more positive about my future in adult football. These players are capable of fairness, despite such a desire for victory.

However in extreme cases, it can even be violence that ends the referees future altogether, and in others, discrimination.

Sky Sports recently reported an amateur referee retiring due to racial slurs, spitting and attempted assault.

Referee Dwayne, who wants his surname to remain anonymous, revealed that after a player refused to leave the pitch after being sent off for dissent, he attempted to attack the referee, and if it wasn’t for his teammates’ restraint, he would have easily.

“I’ve asked the manager just to get him to go to the changing room, I’ve asked about 10 times. I wasn’t getting anywhere so that’s when I’ve decided to abandon the game.

“So I blew up for full-time and from then that’s where the situation got worse. I had players in my face screaming at me.

“If the other team wasn’t there, I actually do think you’d have seen a video clip of me getting punched. It had gone from zero to 100 in less than two minutes, it was just absolutely mental.”

The side whose player had reportedly done this, FC Panda, offered a hand of apology to Dwayne and committed that the player involved, if proven guilty, would never play for the club again.

The FA said:

“While only 77 of approximately 850,000 matches, less than 0.01%, played each season in grassroots football include a reported incident of assault (2019-20 season), we recognise that any assault or incident of abuse is one too many.

“The FA’s Refereeing department will make direct contact to provide support to any individual who is a victim of a physical offence as soon as we become aware of an incident.”

In this piece, we’ve looked at extreme cases such as Dwayne’s, and cases of next to nothingness like my own. Neither should be accepted. Repetitive and tolerated abuse should not be part of a job description.

Without referees, football would be nothing but disorganised chaos. They are a vital cornerstone of the game, and they are desperately needed.

Whether they make the correct or incorrect decision – a vast array of context is involved in this area – is irrelevant. Nobody should be treated in this way for simply doing their job.

The referee is doing their best. Shake their hand.

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