A-League Of Extraordinary Men? (and one woman!)

Okay - Whistler is at the Roar V Perth Glory game last week and the crowd is expressing their disapproval of the calls or lack there of being made by the ref. Comment from behind is something like, "They set up the A-League as a professional competition and they give us Z grade referees." So I wonder - is the A-League a truly professional competition? (For sure, it is a major upgrade of the NSL, but not all players are truly professional are they?)

Granted the match officials are "part time" and rely on a day job, but most of them wear FIFA badges, which means they have passed more than a fitness test. Quiet a few of them have had some kind of international experience, although this may be at youth level. What do we do? Pay a lot more to say we have full time refs? There's still only 4 games a week for them to develop their skills. We could pay heaps to get overseas refs, but one of the best EPL refs can't count to two and issues three yellow cards, before the red. (Actually that's another blog topic!!)

So what's the solution, or do we not need a solution?

Not Offside!!

"I'm blind, I'm deaf - I wanna be a ref!!", was a chant that went up around Lang Park, (aka Suncorp Stadium), during A-League Version One. Well I wear glasses for reading, my kids say I'm deaf and I am a ref. Our two sons are refs, but one pulled out a couple of years ago. Why? He was sick of the abuse from the sideline. Was he a lousy ref? Not from what I saw. He blew the whistle fairly and consistently for both teams on the field. Spectators with little or no understanding of the laws of the game simply destroy the game by burning out young officials. Common to virtually all sports I know.

At the same time - no one is perfect. It is said that refs may make mistakes, but they are never wrong! So I'd like to set up a blog, with a positive focus, to discuss the impact of refs on the game. I have been caught up by the hype and bias at A-League games, only to go home and watch a replay and realise that this call or that call was in fact correct. So let's see where this goes, but please - no emotive comments like, "The ref was crap!"