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#Post#: 19243--------------------------------------------------
Refeering standards in England
DIR By: DBLTFC
Date: July 19, 2020, 7:12 am
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Happy Sunday Everyone, first post, long time lurker. Luton Town
fan and have had a season ticket now for 25 years, but
interested and have officiated leisurely in football and
cricket.
There is a huge emphasis, and rightly so, on refereeing
standards in England. In theory, the country with the best
resources should have the best officials right?
I think as a collective, we do have the best officials in the
world although arguably at the top level it is somewhat lacking.
I find it hard to believe there is such a crop of officials,
like our pyramid, below the top level in any other country.
As per my support, I've seen matches in four divisions from the
Conference to the Championship live. In that time there has been
some progression with standards, but not as much as I would've
expected or hoped. If I look at old videos from 1990, I see some
shocking decisions made in the First Division so of course we
have come a long way since then but time after time you're
thinking to yourself - what has he seen there?
If I compared National List referees to those on the 2A panel,
there was very little difference. In fact, in many cases I felt
they were better at Level 2A.
Could it be argued that the National List is almost a "job for
life"? I hate to use him as an example because he has improved
in recent years, but Trevor Kettle's reputation does him no
favours. He has been on the list for over 15 years now. Never
progressed but not gone backwards either.
I hate how there is a victimisation of referees in this country,
but there does need to be accountability. Clearly there needs to
be a change at the top of PGMOL - I think with the way VAR is
working, Mike Riley's days are numbered anyway. But also, there
needs to be more movement up and down through the divisions. I'd
argue that refereeing assessments / marks could be released.
It is also disappointing that there are no officials who are
ex-players and there appears to be no pathway for these players
to stay in the game. I find it incredible that there are 2500
professional footballers in England, yet only 40 fully
professional referees (not counting the assistants). Considering
the finances aflush in the game, how all referees in the EFL are
not fully professional and thus can rely on stable income, can
concentrate on fitness and have no other employment worries is a
travesty in my eyes. And if they all had a substantial payrise,
surely you will encourage others to go on the pathway.
I don't like the situation in cricket with ex-professionals
almost automatically given a birth into the professional
umpiring ranks, but clearly this has improved standards over the
years.
I presume this is trying to addressed by the FA - I hope to be
reassured there are better candidates coming down the track?
#Post#: 19246--------------------------------------------------
Re: Refeering standards in England
DIR By: DublinRef
Date: July 19, 2020, 7:39 am
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Welcome DBLTFC, I enjoyed and agreed with a lot of your first
post.
In particular when you say a "job for life" I think this is a
real issue, of course we need the steady eddies but for me there
is simply nowhere near enough churn at the national level. I
know in some countries they operate an automatic
promotion/demotion system based on the merit table for that
year, is such a system used at any level in the English game?
#Post#: 19247--------------------------------------------------
Re: Refeering standards in England
DIR By: ajb95
Date: July 19, 2020, 8:04 am
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Unfortunately across the grassroots game there are loads of
games being played without proper referees. With all the changes
coming into the semi-professional game more referees than ever
are going to be needed whether they are good enough or not!
#Post#: 19253--------------------------------------------------
Re: Refeering standards in England
DIR By: RCG
Date: July 19, 2020, 10:05 am
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Some brilliant observations and I find myself nodding at most of
it. Collectively it is still one of the best groups of referees.
Unfortunately your "utopia" of not having jobs for life would be
further eroded if all EFL refs were paid professionals as you
add in contract law to any assessment process (see many a
discussion we have had on here about both SG1 and SG2)
Anecdotal evidence would suggest becoming full time,
professionals has not raised the standard at SG2 level.
#Post#: 19254--------------------------------------------------
Re: Refeering standards in England
DIR By: bmb
Date: July 19, 2020, 10:27 am
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They could offer short term contracts like happens in other
countries. The danger is that the referees here wouldn't accept
them because they do not offer a long term guarantee but they do
work in other countries.
Hungary it's a 3 year contract until age 44 and then it's a 1
year contract, at age 45 it's done on a half season basis -
autumn season & spring season. I think England is the only
country that offers open ended contracts which has proved not to
be the best way of doing things!
#Post#: 19255--------------------------------------------------
Re: Refeering standards in England
DIR By: nemesis
Date: July 19, 2020, 10:30 am
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--- Quote from: ajb95 link ---
>
> Unfortunately across the grassroots game there are loads of
games being played without proper referees. With all the changes
coming into the semi-professional game more referees than ever
are going to be needed whether they are good enough or not!
>
--- End Quote ---
Round our way the percentage of games covered by appointed
referees has risen over the last couple of years.
Sadly, that's because clubs have been dropping out of men's open
age football at a rate of knots.
#Post#: 19256--------------------------------------------------
Re: Refeering standards in England
DIR By: Ashington46
Date: July 19, 2020, 10:32 am
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--- Quote from: ajb95 link ---
>
> Unfortunately across the grassroots game there are loads of
games being played without proper referees. With all the changes
coming into the semi-professional game more referees than ever
are going to be needed whether they are good enough or not!
>
--- End Quote ---
This could well be a big problem because, as you say, there are
more and more games being played at grassroots level without
proper referees and this is not going to improve, even though
more and more leagues fold each year and it is in these leagues
that experience is gained.
#Post#: 19265--------------------------------------------------
Re: Refeering standards in England
DIR By: Left Field
Date: July 19, 2020, 12:44 pm
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--- Quote from: bmb link ---
>
> They could offer short term contracts like happens in other
countries. The danger is that the referees here wouldn't accept
them because they do not offer a long term guarantee but they do
work in other countries.
>
> Hungary it's a 3 year contract until age 44 and then it's a 1
year contract, at age 45 it's done on a half season basis -
autumn season & spring season. I think England is the only
country that offers open ended contracts which has proved not to
be the best way of doing things!
>
--- End Quote ---
Clearly it would be possible to give professional referees in
England contracts of one, two or three years rather like those
with players with the most highly-rated ones on longer contracts
and maybe higher basic salaries. For players this isn't a
deterrent to entering the professional game because most have
had no prior careers and have entered straight from school.
However as you say it could be a great deterrent to referees
considering the professional route who could be reluctant to
give up their career with the possibility of being out of work
due to performance issues or injury after a short period of
time. Even those who have the promise of returning to their
former job may find the career interruption harms their
long-term prospects. Therefore it seems they are probably given
an offer on the understanding that unless their performance is
very poor they will be retained. Maybe this was an unforeseen
consequence of professionalising top-level refereeing - that it
may not have improved performances because it is difficult to
replace low-performers. The alternative would probably be to
give less job security but with very generous compensation for
anyone who is dropped, or they could be dropped to a lower level
or given alternative employment but retain their current pay and
conditions. This does sometime occur in other employment but is
expensive and would be unpopular in some quarters.
Another element though that needs to be considered is that even
if some referees are felt to be under-performing it may be felt
by those in charge that the potential replacements may be no
better. Another potential problem is that removing referees (or
any employee) can cause bad feeling (not just among those
removed but also their colleagues) or it makes those below
nervous about stepping-up in case the same happens to them. All
considered then having a "tougher" line on retention seems
tempting but needs to be carefully handled to avoid problems.
#Post#: 19267--------------------------------------------------
Re: Refeering standards in England
DIR By: RCG
Date: July 19, 2020, 1:25 pm
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So if your bunch of highly paid, full time employees is not
performing to the level expected, you sack the manager. Thats
what the clubs do, why should PGMO be any different?
See if referees improve under different guidance and handling.
#Post#: 19282--------------------------------------------------
Re: Refeering standards in England
DIR By: LateTackle
Date: July 19, 2020, 5:23 pm
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--- Quote from: nemesis link ---
>
> [quote author=ajb95 link=topic=1641.msg19247#msg19247
date=1595163883]
> Unfortunately across the grassroots game there are loads of
games being played without proper referees. With all the changes
coming into the semi-professional game more referees than ever
are going to be needed whether they are good enough or not!
>
--- End Quote ---
Round our way the percentage of games covered by appointed
referees has risen over the last couple of years.
Sadly, that's because clubs have been dropping out of men's open
age football at a rate of knots.
[/quote]
That is absolutely true. A friend of mine ran a Sunday league
for many years and had the usual weekly performance of trying to
cover every game he could, often not managing to do so. More
recently he reported that although he actually had fewer
referees, he was covering games because so many teams were
folding. It's not a problem at all now, as two summers ago the
league folded due to having so few teams that it was just not
viable.
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