What do we think about the recent increase in ceremonial discussions between referee and assistants on TV. We have 2 from Madley (the offside debate with his assistant recently and the Liv/Eve match where he jogged all the way from the left corner to the middle to discuss with Moss) and we have Moss yesterday who went over to the assistant after the penalty that might of been a double touch (wasn't for me).
Personally I don't like it. They have comms so they can have quick and private input from the assistants. Be decisive and let's play. It's one thing at our level if we have neutral assistants and no comms - it can show the players we are trying to work together to make the right decision - but I don't think it's good for the pro game as it slows things down, doesn't offer the audience any more real information, and actually not required as they can talk over comms. Nothing good can really come of it for the referee - take the Madley Liv/Eve example...he has clearly already decided to be everybody's friend by not carding the push, the verbal, the man handle etc but then he trots over to Moss to have a chat. Now if he goes back and starts handing out cards he looks a muppet for missing everything in the first place when he is right there and moss in a different post code - or he does nothing (what he did) and we all know that Moss was encouraging him to do something.
Is this possibly a directive? - "be seen to discuss major decisions". If so I go back to the point that it's really not useful for the audience - slows it down, and doesn't actually give us any more information. Maybe the prem could take a page from American football and publicly announce major decisions over the speaker system in the stadium - they have even started explaining non decisions on mic which I think is great.
Personally I don't like it. They have comms so they can have quick and private input from the assistants. Be decisive and let's play. It's one thing at our level if we have neutral assistants and no comms - it can show the players we are trying to work together to make the right decision - but I don't think it's good for the pro game as it slows things down, doesn't offer the audience any more real information, and actually not required as they can talk over comms. Nothing good can really come of it for the referee - take the Madley Liv/Eve example...he has clearly already decided to be everybody's friend by not carding the push, the verbal, the man handle etc but then he trots over to Moss to have a chat. Now if he goes back and starts handing out cards he looks a muppet for missing everything in the first place when he is right there and moss in a different post code - or he does nothing (what he did) and we all know that Moss was encouraging him to do something.
Is this possibly a directive? - "be seen to discuss major decisions". If so I go back to the point that it's really not useful for the audience - slows it down, and doesn't actually give us any more information. Maybe the prem could take a page from American football and publicly announce major decisions over the speaker system in the stadium - they have even started explaining non decisions on mic which I think is great.