The 5 Top Challenges For Referees

The role of a referee is highly pressured, many people would argue. Officials’ decisions are scrutinised at all levels by players, club officials, spectators, and pundits. At grassroots level, pundits views, thankfully, don’t come into the equation however players, club officials, spectators, get passionately involved in matches and their frustrations often spill over which can provide a challenges for referees.

An officials role can be very difficult, below I share my top 5 challenges:

Top 5 Challenges 

Match Control

To what extent can we control or influence a game we’re refereeing? What factors can’t we control? How much control should we strive for? Should we let things be as they are?

Let’s look at the uncontrollable variables, this is where we, as officials, have no control over or cannot influence the outcome in our favour. Such variables are, the weather condition, playing teams, the venue, spectators, how much time left in the game or to some extent, our colleagues. The list of things not in our control are endless.

Conversely, let’s consider what we can control, which is ‘US’ more specially our Attention and our Focus. Attentional control relates to how a referee can focus awareness onto the environmental stimuli that are most relevant during the task. The process of attending selectively to the most important cues involve concentration.

• Becoming self-aware of the controllables vs. uncontrollables – Make two lists. One list should be the controllables, which are those factors officials can do something about. The other list should be the uncontrollables, which are the elements of performance referees cannot do anything about.
• Create a “What if” plan, this can help prepare you for any obstacles or challenges you may encounter in the ever-changing, fast-paced, unpredictable environment of the field of play. Address the things you really fear in the game. Just list them all. Then address them one by one, asking yourself, is it controllable or not and if it happens I will….
• Concentration cues, highlight and develop a list of correct cues officials should be focussing on when following and off the ball. Use trigger words or short phrases to reinforce specific concentration cues for a task or skill i.e “drop back” or “run towards the corner flag”.
• Incorporate simulation pressure games or drills to train positive responses to adversity (e.g. Use time pressure, making a decision on a Key Match Decision (KMD) or bad movement and positioning etc.).

Dealing With Unexpected Challenges

Conditions aren’t always perfect on a matchday. Rain, excessive heat, poor pitch condition, partisan fanbases and facilities unfit for purpose are just a few things that can steal your focus prior to heading out into the middle.

It is more than likely that you have refereed a game where an unexpected incident occurred. Did it knock you off your game? Maybe it took you away from concentrating on the next set of decisions you needed to make, or perhaps you were unable to regain your focus and, consequently, your performance suffered for the remainder of the fixture.

The challenge for many officials is that they, too often, prepare for smooth-running events, expecting everything to go according to plan. While there may be ideal conditions for refereeing, they come few and far between. Something unexpected will happen in most games, there will always be a bump in the road somewhere over the course of the 90 minutes, if not several bumps. But an unexpected incident does not need to be an unfortunate incident so long as you prepare for the unexpected.

Most officials do not plan for the unexpected, incorrectly assuming that this encourages difficult conditions. There is nothing further from the truth. Top referees mentally prepare for some unexpected events, thus, training their minds to cope with distractions and adapt to circumstances.

To overcome this challenge, create some ‘if/then’ scenarios. For example, “If a player makes a serious foul play tackle and I am surrounded before I have time to go through my discipline procedure, then I will pause, take a deep breath, bring the situation under control and then re-focus on the first thing I needed to do.”

After you have some scenarios created, rehearse them in practice. Have a colleague cause a distraction, then perform your re-focusing strategy.

The Rise In Referee Abuse

First and foremost, officials are human beings and a great many of them are actually children! Whether they are 14 or 52 years old, they are living, breathing, impressionable and they have feelings. We seem to recognise this in the classroom or workplace when we call them “students” and “co-workers”. The best teachers and senior leaders in industry set their agendas with patience, support and encourage them with constructive feedback and praise, and create a safe development environment where they are allowed to make mistakes and fail, because it is widely accepted that this is how you learn. You learn the most from making mistakes and failures.

So, what happens when at the end of the working day and the “students” and “co-workers” are now called a referee? Unfortunately, every week I hear stories of what my clients are experiencing in their fixtures. They are yelled at and called disgusting names by players, club officials and spectators (some of whom are parents of children who are playing) for making mistakes and perceived as failing, using language that, if used in any workplace, would result in the sack. They are demeaned and humiliated by players, club officials and spectators in front of all in attendance, another sanctionable behaviour were it to take place in a professional environment. These players and club officials “lead” by using intense fear and intimidation, creating an unsafe environment that sabotages the development of match officials, kills match control and creates performance problems, again behaviours that would be a case of gross misconduct in any school or office in the land! As a player or club official you are a role model/leader playing a game refereed by a human being who deserves to be respected and treated with dignity.

I will often hear that this conduct is only from one or two clubs. Along with this, I will frequently hear that these targeted officials are simply “too sensitive,” not tough enough and/or are really the problem in the game. So, by that reckoning, if a player or club official only targeted one or two referees to swear at and humiliate, then this would be ok, especially if the targeted officials were “too sensitive?” It’s my understanding that in football leagues, there is a zero tolerance policy for referee abuse.

In all of my years of experience working with thousands of officials I know the following to be true: Bullying, demeaning and humiliating referees does not create mental toughness or peak performance in them. Rather, it makes officials anxious and physically tight, distracts them from the important task of controlling the fixture, kills their motivation and enjoyment of the refereeing, shuts down the learning process and generates performance problems like apprehension, slumps and mental blocks! This kind of behaviour from players or club officials never gets the best out of the officials.

I know that when referee abuse does happen, it makes administrators and some referee managers/coaches uncomfortable.

If you speak to officials of any level or league in the world, aged 14 to 52, you will hear these unpleasant stories. Referees know the difference between good and bad conduct because they’ve either observed it or experienced it directly. However, as adults, in particular: players, club officials and spectators, we need to stand up and protect officials, especially referees under the age of 18, from abuse and call it what it is! Until we do, a negative culture will continue to focus on winning at all costs, at the terrible expense of abusing referees, particularly those who are children.

Maintaining The Safety Of Referees

The Threat To Grassroots Officials

When grassroots football was given the green light to recommence, following the outbreak of Coronavirus, in August 2020, a resentment from players and club officials towards officials was clear for many referees to see. Data showed a clear spike in verbal and physical assaults towards match officials in the first two months after football had returned compared to the previous two months (pre-pandemic) where active football was played. What was the real cause of this downturn in conduct and lack of respect towards referees? Was it pent up anger and rage at being denied the opportunity to play football for so long?

One of the most notable cases during this period was that of Satyam Toki, a, 28 year old referee who was left bleeding after being hit by a footballer he had sent off for foul language at a game in Acton, Ealing, London, on 9th August 2020. Officials from around the country looked on in horror as the video clip of this vicious assault was disseminated across referee forums and on social media. The player who committed the assault received just a warning from police after, initially, being given a 10-year ban by the local football association. Police say they issued the caution after careful consideration, but Toki believes there is an element of racial discrimination to the decision as attacks on white officials have led to assault charges and court proceedings.