29 players, four coaches, and one 'thank you'

Games 20-21, 2022-23

Whenever I went to a birthday party as a kid, or just round to someone else's house for tea, my mum would drum it in to my head that, at the end of the afternoon, I should always remember to say thank you. When I got home, her first question was, "Did you remember?" Maybe you regard good manners as a bourgeois affectation, and you could be theoretically correct, but I'm nonetheless glad that I was taught the value and necessity of basic courtesy. It costs you nothing more than a few seconds and a little exercise of the tongue.

Please, show some merci

Some parties were better than others, it has to be said. Some kids' mothers were better cooks than other kids' mothers (dads did not prepare meals in the English east Midlands in the 1970s). Either way, they had made the effort to invite you round to host, entertain and feed you. Even if all you got was a sandwich made out of cucumber and stale bread, you still said those two wonderful words. Thank you. Thank you for having me. It generally meant you'd be welcome back next time around, and that your mate's parents didn't think you were an ill-mannered little prick.

On Saturday, I reffed a boys' U19 game, and it was pretty much par for

the course. A quiet first half followed by a rowdy second one, with much fouling, howling, protesting, and apparent contraventions of sporting justice. A short speech to the away team coach about him being a model for good behaviour rather than a tantrum-prone tower of twattery. A very lenient four yellow cards. The next day, I put out a tweet: "Boys' U19 yesterday: out of 29 players and four coaches there was a single, 'Thanks, ref', at game's end (away team's goalie). This is about average. I don't expect eulogies, just a touch more courtesy."

The tweet garnered a positive response, but also drew what another respondent called "a weird tweet"

50 touchline refs, but none with the guts to pick up a whistle

Game 19, 2022-23

When Saturday came, I took a day off to hang out with Mrs Ref. We acted like we were on holiday - got up late, went out for breakfast, took in a gallery and a film, then indulged ourselves at dinner. Football only came into play when we watched the Bundesliga highlights just before midnight. When the game's become a year-round, all-pervasive, seven-day affair, it does no harm to shut it out for a short while (or a long one).

On Sunday afternoon I had a level-8 game 20 miles out of town, in another one of those small towns with one bar, one pharmacy, one team. It rained all morning as I toyed with the transport alternatives of bike or train. According to the online updates, the trains were running late or not at all, and I'm stressed at even the first thought of being stranded on a platform somewhere between A and B, with kick-off approaching and the nearest taxi-rank half an hour away. At 12.15, it's raining hard, but at 12.20 it stops and clears, and so I jump on my bike and head cross-country on the old trading route that's now a cycle and hiking path.

Just under two hours later, spattered with mud, I'm greeted by the club secretary with the usual query when he doesn't believe his own eyes: "You came by bike?" The bike rack's empty, but the car park's full. The reserves are struggling at 3-1 down. There's no official referee, so they've commandeered someone from the home club, who's wearing a track-suit and following the government directives to save as much energy as possible. He gives the home side a penalty, generating an opera's worth of choral disbelief from the visitors.

Can I manage games with fewer cards?

Games 16-18, 2022-23

I sometimes wonder if I'm too quick to show yellow cards. There's a fine balance between setting the tone in a potentially difficult game, and coming across as an over-officious twat who loves to dip into their pocket and display what they've got. On Saturday afternoon, I observe a referee who's in charge of a U19 game on the field where I'm about to referee U15s. Instead of dishing out punishments, he deals with every conflict by delivering a few calm and well-chosen words. It's never too late to learn, and for 20 minutes I'm captivated by this young man's ability to manage potentially tense situations.

Put that damned thing away, ref!

Of my three games this weekend, I knew that two were unlikely to cause many problems - the above-mentioned U15 game (it's only at the next age group - U17 - that the hormonal shithousery starts to take off, and finally dwindles about 30-40 years later), and a girls' U17 game on early Sunday evening. Inbetween, on Sunday lunchtime, there's boys' U19 at city level, a league with perpetual firework possibilities. Could I somehow get through this game by imitating the style of my colleague the day before?

My interaction starts with the away team, who have just four players, still in civvies, standing outside their changing-room with ten minutes until kick-off. They know what I'm gong to say, so they start to reassure me that everyone's on their way. By some miracle, we only start five minutes late, though they have no coach, who's

The untouchable dignity of the referee. Plus, beer and a sausage sandwich

Game 15, 2022-23

It takes me three trains to get to Sunday's game, in a small town way south of the city. I have to leave the flat three hours before kick-off, because the train that would get me there in perfect time has been cancelled. There's a 20-minute walk at the other end, and the only sound is of the rain as it breaks against my protective umbrella. Like all small German towns on the week's only sacred day, it's so peaceful that you wonder how they allow raucous, tonsil-testing football games to take place at all. Though the ground is beyond the town boundaries and any potential noise complaints.

As it's been raining for two days, I envision a sloping cow-field covered in puddles - because we're out in the countryside, right? In reality, it's a lovely little pitch surrounded by hedges and, along one side, three shelves of wooden terracing. There are some weird circles of dirt among the green grass, caused - the groundsman tells me - by underground sprinklers that will no longer water where they're told to. "But, you know, they cost €800 each to replace," he adds with the stoicism that's pre-requisite to being counted among amateur football's sub-nation of unsung volunteers.

Back in my changing room, I confront the familiar pre-match emotion of mild dread that now settles into my gut prior to all men's matches. What level of gamesmanship, dissent, anger and all-round shithousery will be in store for me today? There's a consensus that leagues outside of the city are easier to manage, and that clubs are far more hospitable. In general it's true, but it's not guaranteed. I take note of the laminated A4 sheet on the changing-room's desk. Respect. Tolerance. Fairness. There's a special section for the referee: