Ever More Ref Justice

Posted by Aidan at 1:19pm September 21st, 2009

Category: Football, Sportsbook

Einstein set about developing a theory that defined the behaviour of time throughout the universe. The vast, immeasurable, ever expanding, unknowable universe. Without knowing the details, it seems to be something widely accepted as being accurate, but the specific Old Trafford area of Manchester probably deserves a definition of time exclusive to itself. In this small pocket of Earth and even smaller pocket of the cosmos, time expands, contracts and behaves outside the normal rules to suit the needs of a particular team.
 
Of all the things Alex Ferguson can be accused of, being the all powerful entity at the centre of all creation may be overdoing it. Putting out a defence prone to overconfidence and silly lapses is a more fitting accusation, but Man Utd weren’t to blame for taking advantage of the opportunity afforded to them. Winners keep going until the end and that’s what they did, but the horrific officiating that rewarded their spirit that has come to so define this season continues with persistence.
 
Making my play for a cushy job in the UEFA offices, I’ve long since suggested adopting a stop clock system for stoppage time. That way when the fourth official holds up a board with x amount of minutes on it, we know we’re going to get x minutes of football and not two minutes of football, one minute of pointless substitutions and one more minute of mystery Didier Drogba injuries. It would at once eliminate the cynical gamesmanship. By all means kill off a game, but do with unadventurous football rather than hoofing the ball into row ZZ or getting treatment for a strained pinky. Clearly in the case of yesterday, Craig Bellamy’s equaliser meant time added to added time, but it isn’t always applied so generously and it’s the complete and utter lack of transparency that leads to suggestions of darker forces at play.
 
But beyond this one incident and my job application, the Premier League refereeing this season has reached new lows of inconsistency and mediocrity. Even allowing for the ‘they only get one look at it’ defence frequently trotted out, the referees have been shite and it goes beyond the deeply favourable treatment seen at Old Trafford yesterday. On Saturday, Jamie Carragher conceded a penalty after a challenge so innocuous that Bambi would have been ashamed to hit the ground from it. It’s not the first time minimal contact has resulted in a spot kick being awarded, but it was followed up with missing the obvious double hit penalty that most people in the ground seemed to notice, accentuating the error. It’s bad luck, but clearly the goal should not have stood.
 
On Sunday, Howard Webb, the man put forward as the doyen of English referees, had a shocker in not awarding Tottenham a penalty. Spurs still would have lost, but by not quite as much. Robbie Keane was right to ask for a yellow card and without intending to; he raised questions about how referees arrive at their decisions. If it wasn’t a penalty, it was almost certainly a dive because it probably wasn’t a slip.
 
It was utterly nonsensical and we’ve now reached the point where every round of fixtures this Premier League season has had at least one major example of appalling refereeing. In isolation, these incidents are unfortunate and possibly understandable, but as they come on the back of the water-bottle kicking and idiotic sending to the stands incident, missing Emmanuel Adebayor’s obscene head-stamp and a whole host of less high profile decisions, it points to a worrying trend. Referees often get unfair stick for doing a tough job, but sometimes it’s merited. This season it has been merited more often than is comfortable.

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18 Responses to “Ever More Ref Justice”

1. joe stevenson Says:
   September 21st, 2009 at 4:35 pm

   there’s far too much subjectivity involved….get the technology hooked up sooner rather than later…it wouldn’t slow the game down, just think of the time wasted by players whingeing at the referee, in the same time a video ref could have rewatched the incident and clarified what happened…managers will then only have themselves and their players to blame for poor results

2. Steve Howes Says:
   September 23rd, 2009 at 7:04 pm

   I cannot believe that with the ammount of money involved in the game that some referees and their linesmen/assistants have not been approached to give advantage to teams for monetry gain. I am not saying that the officials are bent but nothing has been reported that they have declined the offer.

3. william merritt Says:
   September 27th, 2009 at 12:30 pm

   I’ ts due to all the bets they put on to influence the results , every game that my team have lost this season has had very dubious decicions influencing the result, look how many last minute penalties are awarded.

4. Tom Llewellyn Says:
   September 27th, 2009 at 10:15 pm

   i dont want to defend the refs but they need to be helped by the touchline officials, and the FA. the FA need to introduce goal-line technology soon rather than later, although that isnt the biggest problem with the premier league refs, what they need is a television official, just like rugby, cricket and tennis the hawkeye, feature and asking the TV ref has seen a vast improvement in other sports with accurate decisions that dont slow down the sport that much, all it would take is several angles being shown into a room with 1 or 2 refs that have played the game with constant contact to the ref for instant Q&As between them.

5. ayO tECHNOLOGY Says:
   September 28th, 2009 at 2:09 pm

   Bring on the video Equipment no more digs at united about buyiing off refs espeically from liverpool fans who are just bitter over there own lack of trophys for the last twenty years.But seriously it cant hurt the game .Do believe though that lines men at both goals is a waste which i think is proven already by there lack of help in the uefa games

6. ray larkin Says:
   September 28th, 2009 at 4:34 pm

   the reffing is effing bad but its a tough job.the real prob is global + capitalisation…..the Premier league NEED man u in the top 3 all the time or forign stations wont pay MEGA bucks 4 their product……… Star SPORTS(THAILAND,SINGAPORE,JAPAN,Kuala Lumpa)also Australia,south america,USA all pay big bucks 2 the Premier League because Advertisers pay the TV companys…they wont pay the same if utd were not winning all the time.only way to explain “fergie time” ie:as much injury time as you need to score the goal you need….even without fergie time,there is all the free peno,s,…+.the not sending their players off for kicking out at opposing fellow professionals.

7. ken Says:
   September 28th, 2009 at 9:18 pm

   the problem with refereeing at the moment is you have a lot of corrupt referees refereeing our beautiful game.some of the refereeing decision early into the football season beggers belief.the powers to be must act and act quickly because they cannot allow things to carry on as they are at the moment.the referees are killing the because of sheer greed and blatant corruption

8. julie davenport Says:
   September 30th, 2009 at 7:49 am

   I dont agree with you Ken.

9. montgomery stapes Says:
   September 30th, 2009 at 9:04 pm

   julie is the reason you dont agree with ken is your a man utd fan or a refs wife.he is a million percent right they bend over backwards to help those pricks man u.hope they get stuffed tonight.i wonder how much injury time will be playhed tonight if they are not winning.

10. lfc lad Says:
    October 1st, 2009 at 4:54 pm

    good to see michael owen injured again! all those muppet united fans going on about how good hes going to be again,lol

11. montgomery stapes Says:
    October 1st, 2009 at 7:06 pm

    agree with you there kid ,he stole a lot of money from the mags,hope the curse of newcastle has been passed on to him.

12. montgomery stapes Says:
    October 3rd, 2009 at 4:07 pm

    lump on Munster to sort out Leinster you will never get a gift from god like this again.

13. montgomery stapes Says:
    October 3rd, 2009 at 5:33 pm

    FACT MY HOLE wait till 8pm had a nice little meeting with the team yesterday (THEY WILL NOT LOSE) take my advice now and pay for your weekend.im on bigtime at 11/10.cant wait to collect tomorrow.

14. montgomery stapes Says:
    October 4th, 2009 at 12:13 pm

    yeah sleeping bag have to give you credit their boy ,you are a sensible man,that is why i never make money from betting .weldone t.hey anhialated them.

15. montgomery stapes Says:
    October 4th, 2009 at 12:18 pm

    just watching csltic /rangers two crap teams but who is the cracker presenting the show.

16. lfc lad Says:
    October 4th, 2009 at 7:07 pm

    monty i told you a while ago how crap the both teams were. by the way drogba is one of the most annoying individuals in the game,but brilliant when he stays upright.

17. montgomery stapes Says:
    October 4th, 2009 at 9:23 pm

    anyone that takes points off of man utd will do for me.

18. montgomery stapes Says:
    October 4th, 2009 at 9:52 pm

    sleeping bag is that her name kathleen.

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