"Let's get Physical!" Let's see how that works out

Season 2024-25, Games 1-10

A breath of Champions League

The season's a few weeks old and I've reffed ten games without feeling compelled to write a blog. It's not that games have been any less eventful, but last season I felt that the narrative was repeating itself like a digestive system fuelled up on broad beans and sauerkraut. Coaches continued to jump up and down while yelling at me and their players. Parents and other spectators continued to have no clue about the Laws of the Game. Players were, in certain cases, beyond incredulous at my execrable decisions. The Pope, meanwhile, declared that yes, he was absolutely still a Catholic.

This season the German FA has introduced the captain's rule at all levels of the game (only the captain may discuss 'controversial' decisions with the referee), as well as the 'Stop-Concept' - you can blow the whistle when things get heated and send both teams to their respective penalty areas to just hang and chill for a while. With this back-up, I decided to give reffing men's games another go. The general behaviour isn't that much better overall, but having those official tools at my disposal makes me feel more secure about dealing with conflict and damnation.

Here are this season's sporting low points so far.

It's a corner. It's also half-time. What happens next?

Games 7-9, 2022-23

It's still warm, so after the 30-minute mark a lot of players are asking me how long until half-time. Just before the break, and with no injury time planned, I hold up two fingers and bellow loudly, "Two minutes!" for the benefit of players, coaches and spectators alike. And for me too, so that no one asks again.

A corner. But where is everyone?

The final passage of play takes us 30 seconds over the 45-minute mark, and the ball goes out for a corner to the away team. Acting in accordance with the Laws of the Game, I blow for half-time, and every referee alive will know what happens next - screams of outrage from the away team. "But we've got a corner!"

When you explain the rules to a player who's telling you with bulging eyes that they know better, here's what never happens: they calm down and say, "Oh, I didn't know that. Thanks for putting me right, ref." In reality, they get even angrier. So if you tell them that the only reason to extend a half beyond the allotted time is to take a penalty kick, they will still look at you like you pissed in their kit bag and shout, "But we've got a corner!"

In the mood to chat with the crowd

Game 53, 2021-22

Yellow fields, not cards (pic: RT)

I decide to take my bike on the train to game 53, and then cycle the rest of the way at the other end, probably about 12 miles. I'm on the platform ready to go at half past noon (for a 3.15 kick-off) when all the trains disappear from the departures board, and all of a sudden there's nothing running in either direction. There's no public information, but on my phone app the trains have also been struck off. With no idea how long this will last, I decide to cycle to the match instead. It's a 40-kilometre ride.

Around half way there, pedalling into a relentless head wind, another app's telling me that I'll only arrive at the club two minutes before kick-off. I stop and call them and ask to delay the start for 15 minutes. They're jovial and co-operative and tell me not to worry. Still, focusing on just actually making it there takes my mind off the game. Plus, there have been a host of non-football matters this week that have put any thoughts about refereeing completely out of my head. By the time we finally kick off on a patchy, uneven pitch where the grass is too long, I'm completely relaxed about what may or may not happen around me today. I'm just happy to have made it here at all.

All the Crap and the Chaos: one weekend in the life of an amateur referee

Games 10-11, 2021-22

"Calm the fuck down..." (pic: Natascha Lotze)

Saturday 4pm. Boys U19 match in the city's east park. It's a beautiful autumn day, there are multiple pick-up games, families grilling food, dog-walkers and drinkers hanging out at the kiosk. The home club is friendly, the away team remembers me too. I've not given a penalty all season, but towards the end of the first half the home team gets two in three minutes, both of them unnecessary fouls, and both greeted without a single complaint. The only other incident of note is when a home player yells at me after he's been fouled and I've already whistled for the free-kick. His coach tells him to calm down, I give him a yellow and a stern ticking off. A mostly fair and stress-free game. Pay: €14.

6.48pm. Tomorrow I'm due to ref a men's game in another city at 3pm. I receive an e-mail from one of my assignors saying that "unfortunately, we're losing refs in droves, so I'm asking you to take on a youth game tomorrow morning at 11am, otherwise this game won't be covered. Lots of other refs are doing two games tomorrow." I write back pointing out the physical impossibility of me finishing that game at 1pm and then making it to a different city in time for kick-off at 3pm. I don't hear back from him, but am left somehow feeling guilty that I've turned him down...

Time-wasting and dissent - new laws for Fifa to consider

Happens too rarely - yellow for time-wasting

"Before taking a throw-in, free kick or goal kick, adjust your sock. And then adjust your other sock," a professional coach I used to work with in the US once told my eldest daughter's team. It was advice on defending a narrow lead in a recreational league. The players were 14 years old.

Like the perpetual sore of dissent, tedious time-wasting has become deeply embedded in football at all levels. There are sanctions to punish both, but they are not strictly applied because referees do not want to look overly officious for handing out serial yellow and red cards. The more that dissent and time-wasting have become an accepted staple of football, the harder they've become to punish.

Right after this summer's World Cup, the editor of Germany's kicker magazine, Rainer Holzschuh, wrote a series of proposals to counter time-wasting and unsporting conduct. Here's what he wrote in the July 16th. edition:

Stop screaming at kids. And at referees. In fact, just stop screaming

Game 26, 2017-18

I coach a boys U7 team, and on Saturday morning we had a home game in the Fair-Play League. I am very hands-off and let them scurry around after the ball, backed by lots of encouragement and very little guidance. I stick closely to the League's instructions to keep my team's parents well away from the field of play.

Sticking it to The Man

The away team, however, allows a father to stand behind one goal coaching his son. The kid has the ball in his hands and kicks it straight to one of my players. The father screams at his son for the mistake. My player shoots, the goalie saves (very well), then another one of my players nets the rebound. Making the score... it doesn't matter. We're not supposed to count the score. The father is now gesturing emphatically and screaming at a whole bunch of wee lads: "Where was the defence?"

His two coaches are doing nothing, so I walk up and ask him what on earth he's doing yelling at five- and six-year-old kids. He suddenly looks ashamed, apologises, and then...