Making the right decision - now is the time

ONCE my playing days were over, and my Saturday afternoons switched from scoring goals to describing goals I set myself a task.

Okay, I had played at a high non-league level so I could understand the complexities of the game. I had ‘a feel’ for what managers and players were trying to do, and a realisation that there are grey areas as well as black and white.

A win does not mean you are going to win the title and a defeat does not mean you are going to get relegated.

In a team of 24 sides only three are going to end happy, and only three are going to end sad. There is plenty of scope for grey.

The task I set was to learn more about refereeing. How could I possibly judge whether a referee was having a bad game or not without having put myself in their position.

Most of my colleagues have not spent ten years refereeing or running the line on Sunday mornings in all weathers.

And this is a shame because they are short-changing their readers.

Ninety-nine times out of a 100 a referee makes less mistakes than any of the 22-odd players who he is in control of.

But whereas a misplaced midfield pass will go undetected a 50-50 decision over a penalty claim certainly will not.

Because of my experiences in the middle I am sure I am more ‘referee friendly’ in my reports than others.

And quite right to. Give 90% of referee-knocking reporters a whistle and ask them to take charge of a game and the chances are it will be chaos.

If you are going to criticise then the least you can do is know exactly what a referee or assistant referee has done wrong.

Despite what you read, the game is blessed with top quality referees. Every Champions League game I have witnessed has been superbly controlled by officials from all over Europe.

And to be fair apart from one Coca-Cola Championship match Ipswich Town have been involved in this campaign has been handled by a more than capable official.

Even Jim Magilton has not had cause to whinge.

Fair enough, I can understand a manager slating a referee because so much is at stake. His livelihood – and the livelihood of many of his staff both on the playing and non-playing side of a professional club – could be at stake after all.

But what one manager will see as a disgrace (because it might mean a defeat) his opposite number would view it as a wonderful decision.

And with 50-50 decisions you are always going to get heated debate.

Yes, referees do make errors and they can be costly. But they are honest errors and nowhere as many of them as some scribes would have you believe.

And it was a joy to meet members of the Ipswich Referees’ Association at their monthly meeting this week. A noble band of good men and true, who are doing a wonderful job for football in the area.

But unfortunately with the abuse they suffer – and the Respect Campaign will never work in practice – more referees leave than take up the whistle leaving an ageing group.

And when they retire it could really leave a shortage, which is no more than many players – and reporters – deserve.