BFT(final)G

[linkenholtroyal]

It cant be a coincidence how many youngsters we have blooded since Joses arrival this is obviously where we are likely to be getting most of our second team from next year. to be honest if we had a seasoned player and then a good academy product as second choice I would be happy with that. so.....
First Team Second choice
Gk- New Keeper Southward / Ward
DL-Jordan Obita Omar Richard
DR-Yiadom Teddy Howe
DC-Liam Moore Gabriel osho
DC New defender Tom Mcintyre

this kind of style with a few spare players knocking around I think this is what we are likely to see

[3points]

Actually didn’t think the ref this week was bad at all. Definitely one of the better ones. Hardly noticed him or his decisions which is a good sign

[SCIAG]

Finally the Ref. Is this our worst season for Officials ? I have missed two home games this season; yet apart from Friend (who is a Prem Ref) and a couple who were at best average-this season we have had a succession of absolute plonkers. Where do the League get them from ? Something is wrong here with the whole system of appointing Refs. What must Div 1 and 2 be like ? I rate Friend and Oliver , but no English Ref made the World Cup finals last year and that is just shameful. Yesterday the Officiating by the assistants was very inconsistent. The West stand Lino gave a few decisions to help the Ref; but the East stand Ref didn't. The pull back on Loader ? , second half was blatant and he must have seen it, but did nothing. Was he instructed not to give anything other than Offside and throws ?

I know I am criticised for defending ref's but come on, this sort of comment gets my goat. Some of the refereeing has been debateable and yes even I get off my seat and remonstrate in a pantomime type of way but are you really telling me that of the 23 referee's at the stadiums this season 18+ are absolute plonkers? And you rate that scoring because they are inconsistent.

How do you know they are inconsistent? It's a team of 3 - just because one assistant raised his flag to give a decision, it doesn't mean the other one needs to. Maybe there was no foul over there to give. If a referee see's a blatant foul he will give it, end of. So perhaps whilst in moving he didn't see it, or felt the tug was minimal.

And no, he would not be instructed to just give offside and throws.

I don't think refereeing has been of a high standard, and I actually think it will deteriorate somewhat over the coming seasons because of the young brigade and robotic refs' coming through but calling "hobby ref's" plonkers is just ridiculous.

Yeah agreed.

Think it's also worth pointing out that the reason there was no PL referee at the World Cup was because they nominated Clattenberg and then he disappeared to Saudi Arabia. They tried to nominate someone else to take his place (probably Oliver but possibly Atkinson or Taylor who are all world class) but it was past FIFA's deadline.

Oliver was chosen to referee Juventus vs Real Madrid so safe to say he'd have gone to the World Cup alongside Bennett and Burt if we'd known Clattenberg was going to go AWOL. But frankly I think Oliver is better than Clattenberg anyway so should have been nominated in the first place.

[Hendo]

Actually didn’t think the ref this week was bad at all. Definitely one of the better ones. Hardly noticed him or his decisions which is a good sign

+1 a couple of minor decisions which could've gone either way, but on the whole not too bad.

[paultheroyal]

If a player doesn't deliver, they're dropped. If a manager doesn't deliver, they're sacked. If a referee doesn't deliver, then what? Nothing. The people that say "referees have it so difficult" are wrong, refs make mistakes time and time again and are very rarely punished for it, yet when managers dare to speak out about it with their jobs on the line, they are the ones who are punished

End of the day it's their job to deliver, and if they can't stand up to the pressure, what's the point of them being there. Time and time again, the ref has been abysmal for many seasons now but nothing is ever done about it

If a referee doesn't deliver they are reviewed, if they don't perform they are dropped - simple fact. They are punished for it. A referee would rather perform in the Championship than in League 2 or drop out the leagues altogether.

They do stand up to the pressure, again just throw away words. Sometimes you see things differently or yeah, mistakes are made.

Abysmal - I don't think so.

[Westwood52]

Sorry but the standard of refereeing in the Championship is something I feel very strong about.
It is one of the two factors which will lead me to stop going.
I am trying to be absolutely fair here, and there have been occasions in the past when I have said to my mates that I thought we had a good Ref.But not this season (apart from Friend), and a few Refs before Xmas who I thought were adequate.
WE did in fact had a run (around the Oli facial injury) of four really bad referees .
I shall try to be fair to Mr Stroud. He was pretty good for about the first half hour on Sunday; but by the 2nd half his performance fell apart.For instance there was one obstruction on Loader in the last quarter , right in front of him, which he didnt call.
I actually think Linos have the more difficult job. Calling offside is an exact science and during a game can be very difficult.On Saturday the West Stand Lino called a couple of fouls against us; but late on the East Stand Lino failed to call the drag back on Loader; which he clearly must have seen.
I would be interested to know what instructions a Ref give their Linos pre game; what to adjudicate and what to let go.
On Saturday it seemed the Linos were operating with different instructions.
Is it a training issue , or the standard of Officials appointed ? I agree wholeheartedly that it is a very difficult job and that they need all the help they can get; yet there has been no improvement in the standard for a long time now.

[URZZZZ]

If a player doesn't deliver, they're dropped. If a manager doesn't deliver, they're sacked. If a referee doesn't deliver, then what? Nothing. The people that say "referees have it so difficult" are wrong, refs make mistakes time and time again and are very rarely punished for it, yet when managers dare to speak out about it with their jobs on the line, they are the ones who are punished

End of the day it's their job to deliver, and if they can't stand up to the pressure, what's the point of them being there. Time and time again, the ref has been abysmal for many seasons now but nothing is ever done about it

If a referee doesn't deliver they are reviewed, if they don't perform they are dropped - simple fact. They are punished for it. A referee would rather perform in the Championship than in League 2 or drop out the leagues altogether.

They do stand up to the pressure, again just throw away words. Sometimes you see things differently or yeah, mistakes are made.

Abysmal - I don't think so.

In some senses, I do sympathise with refs. If they have a good game, no-one talks about it, yet everyone jumps on the bandwagon as soon as they make a mistake. Everyone makes mistakes and that's OK, but these mistakes are too frequent in a game and generally some of their calls really are shocking

Take the Cardiff Chelsea game. In my view, that game relegated Cardiff. The "onside" goal and the red card Rudiger should have got. Between the officials, they've almost single handedly won Chelsea the game. But were the officials really punished for that? Or were they back out officiating 1/2 weeks later

On a side note, as you have personal experiences, do you think VAR is a good idea? Personally think it should only be used for things you can prove, such as offsides and not for things you can't necessarily prove (if it's a handball or not etc) because all it does is open everything up to more debates

[Denver Royal]

Paul, I've felt for a while that there's a lot of money in the game now, and more of it should routed to officiating. I'm not familiar with ref training these days, but whatever they need for them to do their jobs better should be afforded. There is a lot riding on their decisions these days, and the quality and standard of refs needs to keep pace with player antics. If they need to be paid more, to attract more and better people in to the profession, then so be it.
I would say the fitness levels of refs has improved markedly in recent years, which is commendable.

[Lower West]

I would say the fitness levels of refs has improved markedly in recent years, which is commendable.

Refs have to be athletes themselves these days.

[SCIAG]

Sorry but the standard of refereeing in the Championship is something I feel very strong about.
It is one of the two factors which will lead me to stop going.
I am trying to be absolutely fair here, and there have been occasions in the past when I have said to my mates that I thought we had a good Ref.But not this season (apart from Friend), and a few Refs before Xmas who I thought were adequate.
WE did in fact had a run (around the Oli facial injury) of four really bad referees .
I shall try to be fair to Mr Stroud. He was pretty good for about the first half hour on Sunday; but by the 2nd half his performance fell apart.For instance there was one obstruction on Loader in the last quarter , right in front of him, which he didnt call.
I actually think Linos have the more difficult job. Calling offside is an exact science and during a game can be very difficult.On Saturday the West Stand Lino called a couple of fouls against us; but late on the East Stand Lino failed to call the drag back on Loader; which he clearly must have seen.
I would be interested to know what instructions a Ref give their Linos pre game; what to adjudicate and what to let go.
On Saturday it seemed the Linos were operating with different instructions.
Is it a training issue , or the standard of Officials appointed ? I agree wholeheartedly that it is a very difficult job and that they need all the help they can get; yet there has been no improvement in the standard for a long time now.

At a professional level the assistants won't really be "instructed" by the referee in that way. I would suggest it's more likely to either be the official's personal style or just things to do with the individual circumstances.

I used to be a fairly good referee by local standards and I strongly preferred running the line - the referee has to consider far more information and make more "subjective" calls, whereas the assistant is usually dealing with a much smaller amount of information and making cut-and-dried decisions. The hardest ones are when there is an unexpected long pass and a narrow offside call when you're not sure exactly when the ball was played, but that's nothing compared to judging a difficult foul decision.

Paul, I've felt for a while that there's a lot of money in the game now, and more of it should routed to officiating. I'm not familiar with ref training these days, but whatever they need for them to do their jobs better should be afforded. There is a lot riding on their decisions these days, and the quality and standard of refs needs to keep pace with player antics. If they need to be paid more, to attract more and better people in to the profession, then so be it.

The Select Group get paid £60k basic plus substantial match bonuses so that's not an issue. But I would suggest that you could pay them the same wages as players and it would have a negligible impact upon retention. Grassroots refereeing is a very well paid part-time job which attracts a lot of young people. Turnover is high largely because of the working conditions - not primarily things like abuse but also weather, the shysters, and the assorted pieces of miscellaneous bullshit. But even in the best case scenario it's going to take 8 years to rise from grade 7 to professional and I don't think anyone has ever actually achieved that (Michael Oliver did it in 10 years iirc).

You do not get to Level 1 (League 1 and 2) without being extremely good, receiving strong marks both from assessors and from the clubs you referee. You do not get to the Select Group without being the best of that lot. There are not bad referees in the Championship - it's just that fans remember the 7% of (significant) decisions that are wrong and not the 93% that are right.

VAR is the best thing we can do to improve the accuracy of decision making. There will still be shockers like the Soares "handball" at the World Cup, but while 99% is not 100%, it's better than 93%.

(I'm using FIFA's numbers for international refereeing rather than PGMOL's numbers for professional English refereeing because I think PGMOL's methodology leads to misleading statistics)