Marking Managers, Players and Spectators

[Matthew]

My Saturday morning youth league has just introduced a new system through Fulltime whereby referees submit a report on every game rating the quality of the pitch, flag any technical breaches (kit issues, team sheets etc), whether CARs were supplied and rate the behaviour of managers/coaches, players and spectators with the following:
- "Behaviour exceeded expectations and consistent with Respect guidelines throughout"
- "Behaviour was of the standard expected"
- "There were incidents of poor behaviour" (with the option to give examples)

It also gives you the option to flag the report as needing attention from league administrators.

It's a little bit of extra admin and relies on refs and the league using it properly, but I think it's a great idea. In theory it gives an opportunity to flag the lower level stuff that doesn't merit a report on its own and helps the league to pick up on repeat offenders. Long overdue IMO.

 

[RustyRef]

The league I am involved with have done that since Full Time replaced Mitoo. Opposition clubs mark each other for sporting behaviour, the away team mark the facilities and pitch, and the referee marks all 3.

The club finishing top for sporting behaviour in each division gets their affiliation fee paid for the following season as a reward.

 

[PinnerPaul]

Wouldn't have marked the spectators very highly on my Isthmian U18s line the other night.

The usual from the greatest hits album "Keep up lino", "Ref, this lino needs subbing", "10 minutes behind play", 4th goal (of 6 conceded!) was "clearly offside" - ref told me at HT, that even he could see it obviously wasn't!

The 'best' was saved for the 2nd half though. Attacker and defender challenge for the ball, just outside penalty area line that meets the goal line on FAR side from me - me about 40 yards away, ref about 10 - admittedly looks like a corner to me, but last touch obviously off attacker as ref gives goal kick - cue my mates "Lino, lino you can see that's a corner. He's (meaning me) been useless all night"

 

[Justylove]

Wouldn't have marked the spectators very highly on my Isthmian U18s line the other night.

The usual from the greatest hits album "Keep up lino", "Ref, this lino needs subbing", "10 minutes behind play", 4th goal (of 6 conceded!) was "clearly offside" - ref told me at HT, that even he could see it obviously wasn't!

The 'best' was saved for the 2nd half though. Attacker and defender challenge for the ball, just outside penalty area line that meets the goal line on FAR side from me - me about 40 yards away, ref about 10 - admittedly looks like a corner to me, but last touch obviously off attacker as ref gives goal kick - cue my mates "Lino, lino you can see that's a corner. He's (meaning me) been useless all night"

Best thing about being on the line is as you've got your back to them they can't see you laughing at them

 

[Gamespoiler]

I can see the benefits of this from a league management perspective but I have mixed feelings. I just think it’s going beyond what the role of a referee is.

 

[Justylove]

I can see the benefits of this from a league management perspective but I have mixed feelings. I just think it’s going beyond what the role of a referee is.

Can't have it both ways.

Leagues need to know who and where the problems are if they are going to stamp out the behaviour that is contributing to referees leaving the game. Having this type of system helps to get that information.

Doing your admin is as much a part of you earning your match fee as running around on the field and blowing your whistle is. These days, everything is much more straightforward and easy to do. If it was an onerous manual task, I'd have more sympathy.

 

[Anubis]

Been in one of my leagues for years, two min tick box most weeks, once a season might need put comments in.

its really not a hardship if in any small way it improves or develops anything in any way

 

[RobOda]

I've seen it implemented locally when behaviour became a very serious issue. We had a 1-10 marking system where teams started at 10 and were docked points for each misconduct. Only stayed for two seasons though, due to the modernisation programme.

 

[Kes]

Two out of the three leagues I operate on already have the "Referee's Match Report Card" which requires e mailing to the League's Referees Appointments Officer within 48 hours of the fixture - have done for years now.
I mean, why wouldn't they?

 

[zarathustra]

Both of my local leagues seem to have given up on that sort of stuff.

Both have moved away from referee report forms to just sending an email with any discipline and breaches of league rules.