What Does It Take To Be a Soccer Referee?

Last Sunday I took my annual referee recertification course, a requirement for referees like me to maintain our United States Soccer Federation badge. Without this certification I would not be in the state referee data base and would not get game assignments. I don't know how many parents or coaches know what is involved in maintaining a referee certification. Here is a summary.

Every year Mass State Referee Committee holds recertification classes in various cities throughout the state. As a referee you log in to your account to register for the class that is closest and is at a convenient time. They're held on the weekends and typically run from 8:30 a.m. to 1:30 p.m. Once you register for a course a link becomes available online where you log in to take a 50 question test. To pass you need to get 75% correct or 38 questions. If you fail you can take the test again as many times as you want. (Last year it took me two tries. This year I got 92% on the first try.) When you pass the test the referee web site then lets you print a letter proving that you passed. This letter is presented to the instructor at the end of the class.

The classes are taught by referees who have officiated for many years. This year the instructor for my class had been involved for 20 years and refereed high level matches. In years past the first thing the instructors would do is hand out another test consisting of the questions that were missed the most often. After taking the shorter version of the test again the instructor picks participants to give their answer and their explanation for their choice, after which the instructor gives the right answer. This year was different in that we skipped this step.

We did cover offside, a call that many parents, players and coaches do not understand. We watched about a dozen videos of simulated match conditions then voted if we thought the attacking player was offside. The instructor then showed the clip again in super slow-mo. We got many of the calls right but also missed a bunch too. The point being made: our brains deal with motion of objects by skipping ahead in anticipation. Sometimes our brains get it wrong.

We then discussed the process of completing game reports. After every game referees are supposed to fill one out, usually online. In 99% of the games it's just a matter of recording the scores at half time and at the end, the field conditions and the weather. However, if there was a serious situation involving disciplinary action such as a red card the game report calls for a detailed description of what happened without getting polemical. It's "just the facts, ma'am." Game reports can become important if the offenders need to be sanctioned or if they challenge the referee's decision. In extreme cases the game report can become a legal document if the courts get involved. Therefore the referee needs to be factual and accurate!

I won't go into all of the rest of our agenda other than an exercise in which we reviewed an actual game video of a youth soccer game in which two players got tangled up and fell down. The first player to get up stepped onto the thigh of the opposing player who was still down. We discussed what decision the referee should have made. (In this case it was a red card which means the player is ejected from the match and can't be substituted, causing her team to play one player down.)

I hope this description shows what is involved in being a referee! If only coaches had to go through the same kind of certification! Naturally this is unrealistic because coaches at the youth soccer level are parent volunteers. I know referees can take a lot of heat while working. I know there might be lazy referees out there but in my experience the ones I've dealt with all want to do aa good job and not influence the outcome of games with bad calls. So, anyone out there who reads this and has a kid playing soccer, I hope you now have a better idea of what those nameless officials running with the kids have to go through in order to be out there.

Change in Scope - Change in Name

Anyone who has visited this blog can see that I haven’t posted anything for a couple years. That’s because after 13 years of coaching youth soccer I “retired” and shifted my focus to refereeing. While my daughters ended their soccer career in 2006 when they graduated from high school I continued coaching at a club and with a friend whose son played in the town’s recreational program. I enjoyed it but the demands of business travel and family commitments won out. Rather than pull the plug on this blog I decided to expand it’s scope to include other sports, primarily tennis and skiing. I thought about rolling this into my blog on flourishing but some of the things I’d like to talk about have to do with technique lessons I’ve learned.

Getting back to soccer, I started to referee because I blew out my knee playing soccer in a men’s pick up game in 2002. (The same year I got a kidney stone so I call 2002 the Year of Pain.)  Torn ACL, PCL and MCL plus a detached hamstring and the muscle bundle at the top of the fibula. Had to have two cadaver ligaments installed and the surgeon needed to sever my quad to make a repair behind it then reattach the quad. The surgery took 6 hours while the rehab took 7 months. I now have to wear an ACL brace to give my leg lateral stability because the replacement MCL isn’t as tight as the factory installed MCL. When I asked the surgeon (whose specialty is knee and shoulder repairs) how my injury rated on a scale of 1 (minor injury) to 10 (major injury) he said it was a 9 for a sports-related injury. (!) Still, I was actually thinking of playing again! That was until my wife threatened to divorce me if I stepped foot onto the pitch again. My compromise was to get a referee license so that I could still be out on the field even though I’m not passing or shooting the ball.

It was a good decision. I was still coaching during the first five years of refereeing so I think seeing things from the player’s perspective helped me see things differently than standing on the sidelines. You also hear the players grumbling about what their coaches and parents are yelling at them. Refereeing gave me the workout I’m looking for but there was something else: the camaraderie with my fellow referees. I have chosen to referee just the games in my town’s recreational program where there is a small pool of referees. And each game typically has three referees assigned: a center and two assistant referees. As a result we get to know each other. It’s similar to the camaraderie that I experienced playing in the pick up games.

So what does this have to do with the change in the blog? Good question! I guess it’s my final installment on a purely soccer-related subject. In future posts I’ll share my experience trying techniques that don’t fall into the traditional advice that people are given when they want to learn to play tennis, ski or even run. As a preview I’ve worked on applying the ideas of the late Mark Papas at Revolutionary Tennis, Harald Harb’s “phantom move” in skiing and Danny Dreyer’s chi running which I use when refereeing. Stay tuned!

Fall 2010 Observations

Another season of refereeing has ended. This fall was a bit different because I also helped coach a boys U12 town team in addition to refereeing. I’ve seen some recent threads on a couple of soccer discussion forums bemoaning the poor state of officiating. Speaking as a referee I know there is a great variety of quality among referees just as there is among coaches (and parents). The job is not as easy as it might look to parents and coaches who are standing on the sidelines. Decisions have to be made on the fly without the benefit of instant reply.

I also know that there is no unanimity among referees. My home games for the boys’ team I coached were officiated by referees with whom I worked on other games. They made some calls I wouldn’t have. I’ve also worked the lines for a number of games where I would have called something differently than the center referee. When I’ve centered games I asked my A/Rs about certain calls I made. Sometimes they agreed with me while sometimes they didn’t. Even when I take the annual referee recertification in which we watch USSF videos of actual games the opinions among us differs.

I think people also forget or aren’t aware of the fact that referees do have to take annual recertification classes in order to keep their badge. Admittedly it’s only 4 or 5 hours a year but it’s more than coaches get! After I getting my USSF D license four years ago there is no requirement to follow up this course. (I think the A and B licenses do have follow ups but I’m not certain.) I’m also lucky in that my referee assignor works some games with me so I’ll ask him for feedback after a game.

I did get a chuckle earlier this season when in one game the coach from my town accused me of favoring the visiting team. In the following game the visiting coach accused me of favoring the home team! In both cases the teams of the protesting coaches played much more physically, using their elbows freely to buy space.

In any case, I know none of the above excuses us referees from trying to do a good job. Part of the frustration, especially for younger teams is that the referees typically are only a couple of years older than the age group they’re officiating. Assignors do this to help these young referees get the experience they need to get better without throwing them to the wolves (by giving them games of older ages where the competition is stronger and the demands and expectations are higher).

Calls on handling

There is a discussion on a Masschusetts forum about a decision that was made in Virginia about handling calls. I posted the following:

Last year while working with another referee I noted that he explained the handling rule to the U12s who were playing. I liked it so much it now is part of my pre-game check in. It doesn't take long but I make it clear that just because the ball touches the player's hand or arm is NOT automatically a foul. I'm looking for intentionally changing the path of the ball to the player's advantage. The coaches often express appreciation for my explanation. I also tell the players that the explanation is also for the benefit of their parents, not for the game I'm calling because the players won't be talking to their parents until the game is over, but for future games.

So far I haven't had any cases of the coaches calling for a handling call during my games.

Further observations from refereeing

Three years ago I decided to get a Grade 8 USSF referee badge. I did it partly because my short playing career came to crashing halt when on November 2, 2002 I jumped to head a ball in a men’s weekly pickup game and landed wrong. Really wrong. I completely tore the ACL and MCL in my left leg, partially tore the PCL, detached a hamstring, detached the muscles that connect to the top of the fibula and damaged the nerve to my left foot. Surgery required installing two cadaver ligaments, severing then reconnecting my quad and unavoidably cutting a nerve on the left side of my knee, leaving a permanently numb spot about the size of my hand. The excruciating rehab lasted seven months.

I miss playing tremendously; not just for the exercise and camaraderie but also for the insights I gained as a coach from being on the field under the pressure of facing live opponents. My solution was to turn to refereeing.

Being a referee gives me a different perspective because I can see the game from the player’s perspective while hearing their coach’s instructions and parent’s exhortations. It has been enlightening. Most of my games are recreational matches played in the town where I live and cover the whole spectrum from Division 4 U10 6v6 to high Division 2 U18 11v11. I have also officiated in MAPLE, MASC and District Select games.

Looking back over the three years several consistent themes stand out.

1. Parents think it is automatically a “hand ball” any time the ball touches the hand of a player. They don’t realize that the call is handling and involves deliberate intent.
2. Parents seem to be more intense at the younger ages, like U10. I hear much more (and louder) yelling at U10 games than, say, U14 or older.
3. Parents (and some coaches) ooh and aah when a player boots a long, lofted ball. It’s almost as though they’re admiring a long passing play in American football. The problem is: in the games I’ve seen these long kicks go to no one in particular so that players from both teams sprint to retrieve the ball. It becomes a 50-50 ball, the opposing goalkeeper picks up the ball to boom it the other way or the ball rolls harmlessly over the end line, giving the opposing team a goal kick.
4. “Send it!” is the most common instruction from parents and coaches. What they’re really saying is to boot the ball to no on in particular. I say this because when I hear “Send it!” no one is in the target area. So, as I said in point #3 above, the “send” becomes a 50-50 ball, a goalkeeper punt or a goal kick.
5. Parents appear to believe that the most vocal coaches are the best. I say this partly because of feedback I’ve received from parents on my club team who feel I need to yell more during the game. My approach is to give isolated, well-targeted advice especially to the players who are on the side closest to me as opposed to micro-managing the game by telling players where they should be all over the field.

Observations from Refereeing

On a Massachusetts soccer forum one poster asked why many games in Massachusetts Premier League (MAPLE) don’t have three officials. This spurred a number of posts by referees who shared their horror stories dealing with abusive parents and coaches. It is well known that there is a high turn over in referees. From talking to various people the biggest drop-off seems to be among the teenagers because of having to deal with adults who challenge them. For many teens this is intimating and even scary.

I got my Grade 8 referee license last spring and have done recreational games (Division 2 and 3) in my town, Massachusetts Soccer conference (MASC) games and even a MAPLE game recently. A week ago I worked the lines for a boys U14 MASC game in which one team was constantly pushing offside. Almost every time I flagged the team for it I could see a parent vigorously and vocally disagreeing with my calls. The center ref (who is much more experienced than me) agreed with me when we discussed my calls after the game. I can see why there is shortage of referees based on my experience.

So why are adults so vocal? Why do they feel they have the right to heap abuse on officials? Her are some ideas.

1. People (not just parents but coaches too) think it’s easy to referee. One coach said as much months ago in another thread on refereeing on the Touchline forum. In my opinion if you feel that way then you’re not doing it right and/or don’t understand the challenges of doing the job properly! I’m sure someone who has never actually stepped onto the pitch to referee (or play) look at the referee’s job as simply running around. They don’t appreciate that even under ideal conditions the referee has to make decisions quickly and on the fly. I’ve found that running the lines is even more challenging than being the center referee because you’ve got to stay in line with the last defender while keeping an eye on the ball and when it is played forward. In addition you’ve calling out-of-bounds, who takes the throw-in and looking for fouls.
2. Many parents don’t understand the laws of the game, particularly offside.
3. The focus on winning and losing regardless of the age or league. This is especially true in MAPLE where one goal can spell doom for a team’s future within MAPLE. So a perceived “missed” call by the parents, players or coach can escalate when so much is at stake. Yet we have also seen some outrageous behavior in MASC, even at the U10 level (!) where last year a parent was banned for the season because of extreme, continued harassment of the official even after the game.

As a coach of both town and premier girls’ teams from U12 through U18 my focus has been more on playing well and doing your best than on winning and losing. Why? Because you can’t control the outcome but you can control your effort. My message to my players is that as long as you play hard, play smart, play as a team and play fairly that you can walk off the field with pride even if you lose. Unfortunately some parents seem to live vicariously through their kids and feel winning at all costs is more important than the level of effort and thought.

But I think there is something else going on here. I think a collection of beliefs at work.

1. That a “bad” call “steals” success from their child.
2. Winning and preserving their kid’s success (the ends) justifies harassing the referee (the means).
3. Treating others without respect and as objects is OK as long as your ends are served.

The combination of these beliefs falls into the trap of believing that of blaming others for lack of success. There is even a whiff of the idea that parents and their kids are entitled to the results they want even if it might really not be deserved.