Never made it past L5 (Supply AR) but I've observed up to 2B on Nat Lge North for 4 seasons now, so I was happy when they relaxed that restriction. There was a discussion on HIVE around Christmas and it seems the average Contrib observer spends around 5-6 hours on their reports. Still the average age of observers causes me concern.It was also a major problem at level 4 when I came through. Lots of very old observers who hadn't held a whistle for decades, and a lot of those have now gone. Those that remain now have to attend training to make sure they observe to current standards not to how it was done in their days.
The requirement that you can only observe to the highest level you officiated has also now been scrapped. Being a good referee doesn't necessarily make you a good observer, and previously the best observers were often held back as they didn't make it as a referee.
Used to average 2.75 cautions per game and 1 red every 5 games back when I was doing this stuff seriously. I don't see how the number of cards issued has any relationship with your ability to referee though...
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