The overall standard of refs this season...

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The FA and Premier League like to pretend we have the best refs in the world...

in reality this has probably been the worst season ever in terms of referee's making shocking decisions on a regular basis.

In general the standard is just mind bogglingly bad for the biggest sports league in the world. I don't buy into the idea that they favour certain teams etc, rather that they just aren't very good at their job or that their job is too hard to do without being able to use replays/technology to aid them in a bigger way than it currently does.

Why is this sport so happy to have bad decisions just be accepted as part of the game ? So much money is bet on the sport, the clubs have so much money riding on finishing positions and yet when a ref makes a bad decision that potentially costs a team millions its just accepted as part of the game.

I've never known a sport with such a high profile be so happy to accept incompetence as "one of those things".
 
I said a similar thing yesterday following Ramires getting away with an elbow right in front of the ref. To be fair to Mike Dean in that specific incident, replays did show that he had turned away at the point in which Ramires struck out but as a general point, I can't recall another season when we've had as many genuinely inexcusable mistakes from the officials.

I may be wrong but it seems like a lot of these shocking mistakes have been the officials not awarding fouls that were rather than awarding fouls that weren't.

After a couple of games involving Liverpool where Howard Webb made several high profile mistakes a theory was put forward that refs in general and specifically Webb tends to avoid making big calls as much as possible as it boosts his chances of being selected for International tournaments and major finals. Following this theory the Telegraph done a stats piece to look at whether Webb avoids making big calls, and the stats suggested he did.

In my opinion Webb's been one of the poorest refs around in the past 2 years (I used to think he was 1 of the better ones) yet he's still regarded as our best and will be going to the World Cup. I wonder whether other refs are seeing this and following suit by trying not to make too many big calls.
 
Standards do appear to be dropping but I'm sure that's coincided with a big improvement in the technology available to the TV viewer. We get replays, close ups and all kinds of statistics available throughout the match, the refs don't have that luxury.
 
Pigeon_Killer said:
Standards do appear to be dropping but I'm sure that's coincided with a big improvement in the technology available to the TV viewer. We get replays, close ups and all kinds of statistics available throughout the match, the refs don't have that luxury.
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For some of the closer calls then fair enough. There's been countless times this season when you've seen a mistake from the official and you're left wondering what on earth was the ref seeing.
 
The standard of refereeing has been absolutely woeful, as it has been for years.

Perhaps fans would be a little bit more accommodating if the referees at least had to explain their decisions sometimes, so you can attempt to see it from their point of view. They're far too protected, if I **** up at my job, I get roasted for it. Do the refs?
 
In a game where 100's of millions of pounds are at stake surely it's about time we have professional referees? Train them from the start, make it a career. Even if they were paid £30k a year that's still a very good wage these days. It would also help if the players were more respectful.
 
MissChief said:
In a game where 100's of millions of pounds are at stake surely it's about time we have professional referees? Train them from the start, make it a career. Even if they were paid £30k a year that's still a very good wage these days. It would also help if the players were more respectful.
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30K a year for essentially a couple of half days 'work' a week is an incredible wage!
 
English Premier League is the biggest sporting league in the world, they say atleast 1 time a week more than half of the population tune in for some sort of Premier League coverage and on every match in Premier League there are multi millions of pounds riding with all these betting companies living off Premier League in United Kingdom, we all know how much players and managers are getting paid, ever wondered how much the main man in highly profile game “the Ref” paid, Weekly or monthly or even annualy ? No Howard Webb jokes please. lets take a look at the EPL Refree’s salaries.

Premier League Referee’s Salaries:
Basic Annual Salary – £38,500
Match Fees – £1,150
Average annual income – £70,000 to £85,000 (basic salary + Match fess)

So in a single season Premier League refrees can make around £70,000 which is two weeks average salary of an Premier League footballer, Thats how much Footballers are being paid at the moment

if this is true then money isnt the issue
 
McBain said:
30K a year for essentially a couple of half days 'work' a week is an incredible wage!
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Yes, but they would get performance reviews, training, regular games in which to improve etc. all the stuff you get in a 'job' rather than doing something voluntarily. If they're not good enough they get cut, just like a normal job.
 
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Pigeon_Killer said:
Standards do appear to be dropping but I'm sure that's coincided with a big improvement in the technology available to the TV viewer. We get replays, close ups and all kinds of statistics available throughout the match, the refs don't have that luxury.
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This to be fair.

I'm a big believer in the need for technology, nothing more frustrating than another weeks games ruined by bad refereeing.
 
McBain said:
30K a year for essentially a couple of half days 'work' a week is an incredible wage!
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But it's not though. Largely it's almost a full time position. The officials need to be at a game at least four hours in advance, which when included with travel time, can mean having to arrive the day before. Also, a number of them operate as fourth officials the same weekend as refereeing a game, whilst also providing officiating assistance to any number of other games (talking about officials at all levels here).

Plus all the write ups and other responsibilities, including reviews, being advised by psychologists, etc. would likely mean they put in more of a shift than the average 9-5'ers.
 
Refs need to train, footballers aren't paid just for turning up and playing on match days. There is MORE than enough money in the prem league to both pay the ref's more, have more ref's(competition amongst ref's is a good thing, match day fee's with a basic wage meaning the worse ref's get punished with less games, encouraging getting better) and use ruddy technology. I think it's a little daft to talk about increasing technology. Stats have been around for hundreds of years. You could count the number of passes 100 years ago, today the difference is someone tells the viewer, not that we needed technology to do it. Same with close up's and replays, mid 90's these things were being done very quickly and very easily.

What is nuts that in a sport where corruption is talked about constantly, dodgy games in Italy/elsewhere, this league has so much money riding on results but the ref's don't use readily available technology that would get 99% of key decisions right with a few seconds of replays? Sports with much less money riding on the results have realised that it's unacceptable to get so many big decisions wrong and made the switch, why can't football..... no reason at all. It's mental that a title, and 10's of millions in sponsorship deals can ride on a call that could be easily corrected with watching a replay. Every other sport deals with the frequency of video replays simply, no other sport had a problem with introduced replays, neither will football.

Would anyone here give up 2 minutes of their day for almost every game from now on having the "right" result? It would see the end of shirt pulling in the boxes, diving, mouthing off at refs, the surrounding refs for every other decision on top of getting the key decisions wrong. Skrtel would miss the first half of the season after video replays are introduced but then never pull a shirt again in his career.

Thing is replays will make the refs jobs SO much easier. No longer will they feel pressure for the key decisions, managers will challenge it and video replay will steer them right far far more often than not. No more fans wanting to kill you, you got the decisions right and they won't be able to argue with the replays either(the vast majority of the time). Fans will be happier when they aren't being screwed.
 
toshj said:
But it's not though. Largely it's almost a full time position. The officials need to be at a game at least four hours in advance, which when included with travel time, can mean having to arrive the day before. Also, a number of them operate as fourth officials the same weekend as refereeing a game, whilst also providing officiating assistance to any number of other games (talking about officials at all levels here).

Plus all the write ups and other responsibilities, including reviews, being advised by psychologists, etc. would likely mean they put in more of a shift than the average 9-5'ers.
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So they do 40 hours+ a week?
 
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McBain said:
So they do 40 hours+ a week?
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No. Do footballers? As has been said on match days it's an all day thing as they can't or don't officiate locally. Then there's reports and if you include fitness time eye then I could see it being 30 hours a week easily. The issue isn't how many hours they do, it's the fact that they won't get better unless they can devote their full attention to it.
 
MissChief said:
No. Do footballers? As has been said on match days it's an all day thing as they can't or don't officiate locally. Then there's reports and if you include fitness time eye then I could see it being 30 hours a week easily. The issue isn't how many hours they do, it's the fact that they won't get better unless they can devote their full attention to it.
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Footballers aren't in question, referees are.

From a profession point of view, where else is their attention? The idea of them going professional was for that exact reason, to improve the quality. It hasn't worked.
 
I think that a big problem is that nobody has any idea what the rules are any more. If someone is touched in the box and stays on their feet is it a foul? What if they choose to go down? Or is it only a pen when someone is floored?

How about handball? Must it be deliberate? Or simply having arms out?

Red cards...any two footed tackle even where they totally win the ball? Or just where they go through the player? Is every table from behind a foul?

I don't know the answers to these questions, and I doubt the refs do either. Everyone has a different interpretation, and it needs sorting out.

It doesn't excuse decisions like the Ramires one last weekend, but it explains a lot of the awful penalty and red card decisions.
 
manic111 said:
I think that a big problem is that nobody has any idea what the rules are any more. If someone is touched in the box and stays on their feet is it a foul? What if they choose to go down? Or is it only a pen when someone is floored?According to the rules of the game you don't need to go down but in practice you usually do otherwise it won't get called. Which is wrong IMO. This then also leads to 'Simulation', otherwise known as cheating. Also there seems to be this attitude 'he was fouled but he scored so it's OK' whereas the offending player should still be cautioned or sent off if the foul is bad enough but this doesn't happen.

How about handball? Must it be deliberate? Or simply having arms out? Once upon a time, long long ago there used to be some common sense when clearly 'ball played man'. This rarely occurs these days but you still see it sometimes. The Man U/Everton penalty? Clear and deliberate.

Red cards...any two footed tackle even where they totally win the ball?Yes, two footed (or raised studs/studs first) tackles have been officially designated a red card offence by FIFA and UEFA and, IMO, rightly so as they're incredibly dangerous Or just where they go through the player? Is every table from behind a foul? Also yes. Again because it's dangerous. At least through the legs tackles as you're also likely to get the man.

I don't know the answers to these questions, and I doubt the refs do either. Everyone has a different interpretation, and it needs sorting out.

It doesn't excuse decisions like the Ramires one last weekend, but it explains a lot of the awful penalty and red card decisions.
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The video review board is a good thing and I o hope they look at the Ramires thing and ban him for 3 games, equivalent to a Red Card.
 
MissChief said:
The video review board is a good thing and I o hope they look at the Ramires thing and ban him for 3 games, equivalent to a Red Card.
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I agree with your points above, but the problem is that as the rules have changed they have become more open to interpretation, leading to more inconsistencies.
 
Has anyone looked at a statistical analysis of refereeing performance or are we basing this on our team getting screwed over by a couple of decisions recently?

I can't say that I've noticed a performance drop. I think the debate on whether goal line technology should be used has been settled though.
 
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