Playing on when the pitch is unplayable

Games 16-17, 2019-20

A Sunday afternoon men's game in the arse-end of a satellite town attached to our city. It's raining, so I take the train and then walk two miles to the ground alongside a busy four-lane road, passing petrol stations, dubious car dealerships and repair shops, and a lone bar grandly called the Bistro Royale with brown cafeteria tables and a sparse, all-male clientele. I reach the ground an hour before kick-off and immediately take a look at the compact cinder pitch, bordered by a huge car park, a faceless housing estate, and a grass field that looks in much better condition, but is already closed off by a protective groundsman.

Slightly moist conditions on
the far touchline
(pic: fussball.de)

The pitch is playable at 2pm, but by kick-off at 3pm it's already developing puddles, and the rain's only getting worse. Amazingly, people are actually paying to get in at the gate and watch this, around 50 in all, most of them equipped with umbrellas. A van pulls up in the car park and its driver starts hooting and screaming out the window. When the home team goes 1-0 up after 20 minutes, he does it all over again, but after that he's mute - within another three minutes, his side's trailing 2-1.

After this, it gets chippy for a while. The away team's number 8 goes down in an aerial challenge, but his team gets the ball in a promising position and I play advantage. They lose the ball and, as the number 8 is still lying in a heap, I stop play. He peels himself out of the slime and starts to yell at me for not calling a foul. I tell him that I played advantage. "Advantage?" he repeats, incredulous. "Advantage?" Like he'd ordered and paid for champagne, and I'd just served him up a jug of steaming rat's piss. "Yep, it's part of football," I say and run off, because he's back on his feet and remarkably unhurt...

A seemingly perfect game, until the Angry Men appear...

Game 15, 2019-20

The assistant coach of the U17 home team is (guess what?) in a rage. It's just a few seconds after the final whistle, his team's lost 0-2, and both he and someone else who is probably nothing to do with the team come stalking off the dugout to Have Their Say. Something to do with a handball.

We all know that all coaches know
 these better than the ref.

I think they're referring to an incident in the fourth minute of injury time when an away team player deliberately stopped an attack with his hand. The trailing home team took an immediate free-kick, so I didn't bother with the yellow card. The offender was probably looking for the yellow card anyway to waste time. I try to explain this to Mr. Angry and his outraged chum.

Only, this is not what they're upset about. It's another incident which they claim I missed, and which should have been a penalty and a yellow card. The problem is this - I've just reffed an 80-minute game and made dozens of decisions. I genuinely don't know what incident they're all tearful and red in the face about.

The rare and vital value of a calm captain

Games 13-14, 2019-20

It's been a quiet Sunday - I'm almost an hour into my second game of the day and I've yet to show a card. The away side's number 10, however, has been in my field of vision since a series of fouls in the first half. Now he trips an opposing player a few yards outside his own penalty area, then kicks the ball away when I whistle for the foul. I show him the yellow card.

'A Quiet Sunday' by
 John Inglis McClymont

His captain asks me politely if a yellow card is not a bit harsh for the offence. I reply that the player had already committed three fouls in the first half, and that I'd had a word with him about his conduct. The captain says, "Ah, I see. Okay, that's fine." And moves away.

A few minutes later, one of his own players is clattered in central midfield, and stays down briefly injured. The home team's player apologises and tries to help him up, but the player's not ready. The fouled player's team-mate marches over from his position at right-back and loudly starts a sentence aimed at me with the words, "With all due respect..."

Why can some players not just shut the hell up?

Game 12, 2019-20

Why are some players quiet throughout every game of their career, and some just can not stop their gobs? They yell at team-mates, they yell at opponents, they yell at referees, they'd probably yell at Jesus Christ if (s)he floated down on the pitch for a second-half Second Coming. "Not now, Jesus, we're 2-0 up with 10 minutes left. Come and save us after the final fucking whistle, Christ almighty!"

"Jesus Christ, get off the ****ing pitch!"

I reffed the home team a few weeks ago in a pre-season friendly that ended up with nine yellow cards, four of them for this particular team. I check the game report to see who offended, and what the offence was. I take particular note of players I've cautioned for unsporting behaviour and, even more so, dissent. That would be the diminutive number six, a central midfielder.

Last time around I showed him a yellow after just 19 minutes, which ensured that not only he, but everyone else too, stayed mostly quiet for the rest of the game. This time, he starts up again not long after the opening whistle, moaning about every call. I reach for my pocket...

"Why is your refereeing so shit tonight?"

Game 11, 2019-20

One of the reasons I love refereeing is the number of philosophical discussions it leads to about the game, both off the field and on. At the end of 90 minutes in last night's City Cup game, for example (score: 1-1, with extra time about to be played), a defender on the away team came up to me and asked, "Why is your refereeing so shit tonight?"

My reffing, last night.

Good question. Am I having a bad day? Am I biased against his team for reasons real or imaginary? Am I just in general not fit to arbitrate the game of football due to a lack of knowledge, experience and temperament? Or does the player hold a distorted view of my officiating skills because five minutes earlier I'd sent off one of his team-mates for his second yellow card offence, and now they had to play extra-time one man down?

Correction, make that two men down. Insulting the referee is a straight red card.

The player is astonished. What was the red card for? Well, I explain, you just insulted the referee. No I didn't, he maintains. I didn't say you're a shit referee. I just said that tonight your refereeing is shit...

"You wanted that, didn't you? You wanted that!"

Games 9-10, 2019-20

Coming soon to my city -
XXX-rated football

There's a new under-class in the city's football scene. Sensing that there's room to sink even further, a new City League C was created out of the bottom-feeders of last season's B divisions. At some point, I'm fully expecting us to plummet all the way to Z, barely pausing for breath at X, XX and triple X on the cascade downwards.

After 40 minutes of Class C sport, I stop the game and tell both captains to huddle with their teams and tell them: "Either you quit fouling and fighting, or I'll call the game off and recommend that both sides face lengthy bans." We've just seen the game's fifth and sixth yellow cards after a second mass confrontation. For once it's not me, they just seem to hate each other.

The home team's been banned before, so they in particular take notice. At half-time I chat with their trainer on our way to the locker room, and he promises that he will make clear to his players the need for discipline...

When 22 moaning men shatter your confidence

Games 7-8, 2019-20

"This isn't a football game any more," states the home team's captain as he leaves the field. I've just shown him his second yellow card after he pulled back and brought down the away team's swift outside right as he hares towards the penalty area. The score is 0-4. Five minutes earlier I'd shown him his first yellow for his sullen, sarcastic query of, "Are we not playing offside today?" after the away team's fourth goal.

What now? Hungry? Lost dummy?
Or just another scandalous offside call?

No, it's not a game of football any more. It's a forum for petulant whiners. It's a maelstrom of bleating, skill-deprived tossers in acrylic uniforms. It's a platform for snorting, righteous, hot-eyed wankers viewing every call against them as a heinous affront to their dignity as human beings. This has nothing to do with a football game. Especially not among the home team, most of whom are shit (five minutes in, I predict a scoreline of 0-4).

Both teams are at it, though. All afternoon. Every foul called is not a foul. Every foul not called is, by contrast, a foul. Every offside decision called is not offside. Every call of 'play on' after an offside appeal is - you've guessed it - horrifically erroneous too. Of course it's offside. Four slow, stubby and rubicund defenders are screaming that it's offside, so it must have been...

Justice, mayhem and two very quiet games

Games 5-6, 2019-20

First, some news: I heard from a fellow referee over the weekend that 'Danny', the coach sent off during The Game From Hell at the end of last season, has been suspended. He didn't know for how long, though my personal hope is that it's a life ban valid across the entire EU. "Every referee in the city knows him," says the young ref, who's registered at Danny's club. It's reassuring to know it wasn't totally personal.

'Friends of Sport' line up
for Saturday's reserve game.

In other events, the reserve team of the club whose name translates as 'Friends of Sport' yesterday played the reserves of the club I belong to. Four of their players were red-carded, as well as the head coach. His assistant then physically attacked the referee. The game was suspended.

I referee the 'Friends of Sport' U15s the day before, and they are absolutely fine, although they're on the right end of a hammering, which always helps. I speak with both teams beforehand in their changing rooms while checking their passes. "If I make a shit decision, and it might happen, still keep your opinions to yourselves, please." Most of them smile at the instruction, they're not yet quite full-on teenage moody-mouths.

I also talk individually with each coach and ask them not to yell at me, rather to save any questions about decisions for the interval, or after the game. "I do get emotional," confesses the home team's coach. "Me too," I reply. "But not when I'm at the football pitch." His emotions remain in check, though, and after the game he thanks me sincerely for a good game, despite the result.

On Sunday it's back to the amateur men's league on another hopelessly hot afternoon. It turns into quite a well-played, well-balanced game. At 1-1 in stoppage time, the away team's forward breaks clear through on goal, but he was already a yard offside when the ball was played. "Never, never was that offside!" cries the hulking centre-back from 30 yards further back. But it was. The score stays 1-1, and this heart-ripping protest plea is the only time anyone objects to a call during the course of the afternoon. 

So, the first two league games, and just one yellow card. In some parts of town, sanity's broken out. A club elder seeks me out to shake my hand and compliment me on a good afternoon's work. I'll repeat what I've said before - such simple gestures of gratitude mean the absolute world to referees. Don't be shy about being decent.

Game 5: 1-8 (no cards)

Game 6: 1-1 (1 x yellow)

Want to read more? Click here to order Reffing Hell: Stuck In The Middle Of A Game Gone Wrong by Ian Plenderleith (Halcyon Publishing), published on August 8, 2022. 

Club linesmen - they only have one job...

Game 4, 2019-20

Unless they find a way to reverse the aging process, I will never again referee with 'proper' linesmen. I don't miss running the line myself - too much quiet time, and you get to hear too many comments from spectators who think they're being funny but in fact are just being twats. There are times, though, when I wish that I could still referee with a proper three-person team. A lot of times, in fact - that is, almost every time I have to deal with a club linesman.

Quick recap - club linesmen have only one job. To indicate when the ball is fully out of play. Just that one job. Despite that single, simple task, sometimes it's easier to do without them. Not tonight, though.

Typically keen posture of a club
linesman (pic: Bobbles Blog)

I'm refereeing a men's friendly on a manicured grass field, but the lines are marked in a fading white. It's a 7pm kick-off, and the descending sun's rays slant across the pitch to make them even less visible. We start the game with a sub from the home team holding a flag on the bench side, but leaning back against the dugout with his arms folded. The other side of the field is unmanned and the line is almost entirely invisible. After 10 minutes I ask the away team to send someone over - so one of their subs hunts down a flag and reluctantly traipses around the sideline to take up his position...

Can I be your in-house referee?

Game 3, 2019-20

If you whistle for a penalty that no one's appealed for, does that mean the foul really happened? In the fourth minute of last night's game, an away team defender shoves over the home striker as the two of them are competing for a bouncing ball. It seems so blatant, yet there are none of the familiar shrill cries of "Referee!" before I make the call. Is it because it happened so early in the game, and no one quite expects to see such an unnecessary infringement so soon after kick-off? 

A penalty-area tussle during last night's game

Even more uncanny is the fact that no one complains. There are not even any groans of exasperation at my myopic decision. Not a single away team player tells me that I've got to be joking. The defender does not stride over and insist that he was only doing a, b or c - with a. denoting they played the ball or b. they were just shielding their space or c. that they didn't even touch the opponent. But no, they just accept it. The number nine steps up and converts. 1-0. And after that early setback, there's still not a breath of dissent.

It worries me for a while. Let me repeat: no one appealed, and no one complained...