Is Incompetence Forgiveable in any job?

Actually that's a very salient point. Much as we are (rightly) having a good old moan about Friend's performance as a referee on Sunday, that was a very, very good decision.

 

The very first thing they need to do is get rid of this idiotic "not re-refereeing decisions the ref has seen" nonsense.

 

Was it good decision, or did he see it as an opportunity to make up for not giving us a penalty?
A case of two wrongs, in his mind, making a right.

 

Its true that we only tend to see/remember the one or two decisions that don't go as we think they should and forget the rest that are generally spot on.

 

I can't agree with that on the basis that I see so many "non-match changing" decisions made in correctly. The ones where the ball clearly hits a player before going off but the throw-in goes the other way (both teams). There seems to be loads.

 

I know what you mean but I think what I'm really saying is that actually, referees make correct decisions most of the time for which they get no credit.

Many's the time I see a good tackle given as a foul (live or on TV) only for the slo-mo to prove the referee correct. But referees are like goalkeepers in that they aren't permitted any mistakes.

Yes, we should have had a penalty against Liverpool but is that why we lost the game? No. And yet so many managers (and fans) will blame the referee for a defeat, choosing to ignore the bad decisions and mistakes made by their players.

 

Maybe the question should be directed to the Prime Minister?

 

How can you say, without doubt, that not being given a penalty wasn't the reason for the loss?
Score the penalty, and it's back to 1-1, and second half we are not so gung-ho, leaving gaps and space for quick breakaways, one of which led to their second.
Not saying we'd have won, if the penalty had been given, and scored, but not giving it was a game changer.

 

Of course we might have won if we'd had the penalty. But that is not the same as saying that not getting the penalty is the reason we lost.

We should have won that game penalty or not but we didn't have the creativity where it was needed. If you simply blame the non-penalty then you are going to miss an important lesson. We now know for sure that we need to try something different to get back to scoring goals.

So, of course it may have been a factor but blaming the penalty is counter productive. How about blaming someone for not closing Coutinho down? Maybe if Liverpool hadn't scored then we would have won. There are any number of potentially game-changing incidents in a match. When the West Ham goalkeeper was sent off for example, we all thought it would be the catalyst for a Saints win but instead they just shut up shop and played out the draw.

 

http://www.theguardian.com/football...-up-conversations-no-more-talk-about-referees

It's not so bad. Just be grateful we haven't got the French refs. Or the Italians. And certainly not the Spaniards.

 

At last...common sense.

 

I like the 'stop moaning at referees' view, but I don't think it has any relevance at all to do with the tactical ineptitude of English football. I know he's not really saying this but he does link it in his article.