Given that the matches on TV are generally considered the biggest of the weekend I do find it strange that Pawson, Taylor, Moss and Dowd are the ones selected, especially since at least 3 of them were heavily criticised for their performances over the Christmas period. It reminded one of the criticisms of Riley that I read recently, either Poll or Hacket was saying that there's no real ranking anymore and any ref can get any game. Given how many poor refs we have at the moment you'd really think it would make giving the best refs the most high profile games would be the best way to go about it for now. Then again, who are the best refs? Clattenburg and maybe Swarbrick? It's certainly not much of a list anyhow.
Well said. I'm sorry to say that I'm on the verge of giving up on it all. Unfortunately you'll never hear any major criticism from the media or pundits because decisions that are on the face of it subjective more than often favour certain teams, and the other decisions are just plain wrong. Am I worried about 'slowing down the game', about 'not having the same technology' on Hackney Marshes as in the PL? No. I just want the right decisions. And if I hear again that bollox spouted by the pundits that 'it all evens itself out over the season'...
I think I'm at the point where I'm trying to look on the season as one big exhibition. There's a lot I enjoy about following Spurs, especially the spectacle of the game itself, the posters on this board and other fans, and the chance to watch young players develop into stars. I don't want to give that up, but taking the results seriously seems like a kind of strange masochism. I've followed the Cubs, a hard core loser, 4/5ths of my life. I'll follow them for the rest of my life as well. The truth is they have a genius for losing and after so long I take a bit of pride in it. But taking results seriously for a team that has a tendency to fall just short in a contest that’s looking more and more certainly rigged, IMO...I just don't know. I imagine I’ll take them seriously anyway, though. For perspective, the NFL had a big uproar in one of its playoff games yesterday. The call wasn’t actually, provably wrong. It was a poorly written rule that didn’t allow for a clear interpreation, even with replay technology. They will probably rewrite the rule in the offseason, if the past is any guide. So replay technology won’t make everything perfect. It will just eliminate 95-98% of mistakes.
why not go all out for a season with the refs being miked up and all conversations being monitered, accepting no one except the captain approaching and confering with him while on the field and the manager of each team allowed a certain time after the game to air his concerns over desisions in the dressing room with the ref and an assessor, any player or manager deviating from this rule to be sent of for the remainder of time left in whichever half of the game they are currently in, also if the captain or manager abuses the ref when approaching him ban him for the following game automaticly. I also would like to see them come down hard on all the holding that goes on at free kicks and corners, the six yard box has more in common with a wrestling ring than a football pitch sometime, it only needs a couple of weeks of penalizing players and teams and I think it would maybe not stop completely but we would certainly see a decrease in the committing of such fouls
Taking up your valid point about the wrestling at corners, it's astounding, when you think about it, that Rooney feels it's ok to grab Kane around the waist and throw him to the ground in full view if 35.000 people at the ground and millions on TV. Not only does he feel it's ok but he gets away with it scot free. If that is not bringing the game into disrepute then I obviously do not understand the term 'disrepute'. When you book a player for taking his shirt off in celebration of a goal and yet ignore blatant cheating in the penalty area witnessed by millions there is something seriously wrong with the policing of the game. The football authorities need to address this.
I agree, I think I heard one of the so called ex pro experts laughably say that the ref cant act because when the pulling and holding is taking place in most cases the ball isnt actually in play, well they must watch a different game than we do
So when the guy celebrates a goal by removing his shirt, the ball is not in play. How come the ref can book him then?
exactly my point if anything occurs during a game whether in play or when play is stopped it should be punished,
The ref can show a yellow or red card for things that happen when the ball is out of play but he can't give a free kick or penalty. This is another area where football could learn from Rugby when the ref has much more discretion (and can even reverse a penalty based on subsequent events).
At this point I would be reassured to see anything resembling a will to improve the officiating. If I were in charge of a league, and I wanted to tilt the field towards the biggest teams without it looking too obvious, and I was willing to accept them occasionally finishing behind some of the smaller teams, I’d set things up the way the PL is set up now: no replay, crap refs, especially the kind of crap refs who are easily intimidated, and no transparency to which refs are picked for which games. The fact they’ve brought in goal line technology supports my point. Sure, there will be no more phantom goals and non-goals, but over the course of a PL season, how many are there of those? Two or three? Not enough to make any difference to anyone except Spurs.Let’s see them use replay technology for pen shouts and offside decisions. Then I’ll be convinced the FA is serious about dragging the game out of the disrepute it’s now in.
Let's think of the memorable decisions that involved Premier League teams. There was our non-goal at Old Trafford that even Ferguson admitted had gone in. Then there was Chelsea's goal against us that didn't cross the line in that game that they won 2-1 and the other goal was offside. What else? Oh, the other Chelsea goal in the FA Cup semi-final against, oh who was it? Oh, us again. Then... Liverpool's goal against Chelsea in the Champions League when his only other choice was to send off Cech. Anyone remember any others? 3 involving Chelsea, 3 involving us and one each for the Scousers and Mancs. There must be more than that, surely?
Mark Hughes had one when he was at Southampton vs Leeds - he hit the ball so hard it hit the hoardings behind the goal net and bounced back out with a loud thud, so the referee assumed it must've gone wide.
Maybe I should be more grateful for goal line technology. Those three that went against us were all epic in their way. I still remember the TV comment after the replay of the last Chelsea goal that wasn’t against us.. "Nowhere near."
Referees' chief Mike Riley has claimed that everyone else is wrong about falling standards and that his organisation is doing a good job really. He believes that the officials are actually better than ever and that the increase in scrutiny and coverage has distorted public perception of mistakes. He would say that though, wouldn't he? Vaguely on the same topic, does anyone know what happened to Sian Massey? Seemed to be everywhere a couple of years ago and now seems to have disappeared, for some reason.
