Genuinely shocked at low quality of Refs this season

[LN747]

I never expected the refs to be so poor this season - not saying it’s why we haven’t made it this year , it didn’t affect Ipswich et al 

I know it goes with the L1 territory but that decision yesterday summed it up

No foul, covering defender, covering keeper , ref in good position…the list goes on

And the way they strut around like mini  Mike Riley’s 🤢 

They are just inept 

Maybe the new tv money will improve standards and give the Efl / refs more money training them up 

 

[Rambam]

Just now, LN747 said:

I never expected the refs to be so poor this season - not saying it’s why we haven’t made it this year , it didn’t affect Ipswich et al 

I know it goes with the L1 territory but that decision yesterday summed it up

No foul, covering defender, covering keeper , ref in good position…the list goes on

And the way they strut around like mini  Mike Riley’s 🤢 

They are just inept 

Maybe the new tv money will improve standards and give the Efl / refs more money training them up 

 

Yes, as already posted, the ref couldn’t wait to penalise and send off Davies, but apparently this assault on Forsyth was perfectly legit. The ref saw it, but when Forsyth got up and raised his arm, the Wednesday player fell down, and Forsyth was penalised. 

[Rambam]

It makes me want Derby County to raise an investigation with the EFL regarding possible match fixing. 

[Loughborough Ram]

Referees have genuinely never had more help than they get these days, and yet the standard is lowering in front of our very eyes.

The refs in our division display a complete lack of understanding of what is going on for most of their time on the pitch.

Players clearly cheat for most of their time on the pitch and maybe the way forward for football, and refereeing in general, is to be aware of this and to counter it rather than condoning it and only penalising a small percentage of it. 

[Ram-Alf]

Yesterday and many many more poor performances this season hasn't shocked myself, It's not just DCFC that has been let down...all of football has been let down, How can it be that a part time official are they part time down in L1? can have so much influence over a multi million £ business?

It's OK tho as they're human beings...who are prone to making mistakes, The point of officials is to be fare and impartial...I didn't see that yesterday, I saw an official who was quick to give a Penalty and Red card...yet absolves all responsibility when looking at Forsyth having his shirt ripped off at a corner.

  

[Loughborough Ram]

I'm not sure about the fozzie penalty appeal personally. In my opinion fozzie ran at the player and went down theatrically.

Having said that, it's impossible for fans to say something was or wasn't a foul these days when referees seem to have absolutely no clue what is or isn't either.

[alram]

they are crap in the premier league, did you expect the quality to be better two divisions lower?

 

and people need to knock off the efl agenda stuff, it is idiotic. the refs are just incompetent and useless

[Crewton]

1 minute ago, Loughborough Ram said:

I'm not sure about the fozzie penalty appeal personally. In my opinion fozzie ran at the player and went down theatrically.

Having said that, it's impossible for fans to say something was or wasn't a foul these days when referees seem to have absolutely no clue what is or isn't either.

That was enough to earn Marvin Johnson a penalty and Curtis a red card.

It's that inconsistency which is killing the game.

[ilkleyram]

When I first started watching live football we had lardy, incompetent refs and linos from all over Europe come to the BBG often making poor decisions.  What we also had then - though we didn't really appreciate it - were players who helped run the game despite the referee.  You had very little diving (Franny excepted and the dirties generally), feigning injury, time wasting, rolling around, so called professional gamesmanship.  Players generally just got on with the game without moaning too much.  Watch old footage and it's a completely different (and much better imo) spectacle.

The sea change was the EPL and Sky money.  The influx of players from overseas (not all of whom added bad habits - Bergkamp, Ardiles, Eranio, Baiano - and many others, were hugely positive additions), the added/greater importance of money on businesses/clubs succeeding, the growth in a win at all costs attitude, the language - the refusal to call it out as cheating the essence of the sport, because TV/pundits don't want to damage the brand - pundits and TV coverage themselves offering greater exposure, technology that allows 20 cameras to a match, all played a part in raising the importance of the match officials and their individual decisions whilst diminishing their reputation, despite the fact that refs and linos now have more money and attention and training and technological help than they ever did before.

If we could somehow get back to the point where players helped officials by not falling down theatrically when Curtis coughed on them in the penalty area (ie cheating aka 'you made the ref make a decision'), if we could get back to the point of real men playing (mens) football and accepting life's slings and arrows and playing the game sportingly, of no pundits ever dissecting a ref's decision (or preferably no pundits) and just moving on, if we could abolish VAR which serves to question every decision the officials make, then we might start to get somewhere.  As there's fat chance of any of that ever happening we're largely stuck with what we've got until technology takes over completely.  And even then it'll be wrong.

 

[ram59]

It's not uniform incompetence though. Generally things should even out over a season. We have disproportionally suffered at the hands of the officials this season.

A situation not helped by opposition players theatrically throwing themselves to the ground on a regular basis.

Like it or not we are going to have to resort to the dark arts, if we want to get anywhere next season. Having morals doesn't get you promoted, we've been the victim of the dark arts from Plymouth, Ipswich and Sheff Wed, so they've probably being practicing this all season against other teams. These weaker officials without VAR back up are easier to con and we have to play the same have as everyone else.

[Carl Sagan]

What I don't get is how bad they are at all levels in the English game. We have the most money in world football, yet the lowest standard of officiating. When there are international tournaments it's striking how vastly superior all the overseas officials than the English ones at the tournament.

They can't even use VAR properly. Here we have Stuart Atwell at Stockley Park not thinking this was a penalty, as Lindelhof moves his arm out to pretty much catch the ball and juggle with it. Though it's shocking neither ref nor linesman gave it anyway.

 

Edited May 8, 2023 by Carl Sagan

[bcnram]

I think some of the referees have been ok, there has been a few 'howlers' but we had that in the Championship as well. The outstanding referee this season has been the young lady (can't remember her name).

The FA / EFL could make it easier for referees by allowing them to review a 'clear & obvious' on a screen after they have made a snap decision. It might encourage some of them to just take a second before giving a critical decision such as penalty or straight red card.

[1967Ram]

Where players have obviously cheated, the repercussions need to be swift and made clear. It won't happen though.

[TomTom92]

Pretty sure a rival fan upon confirmation of our league 1 status came on here and gave a summary of what we had to look forward to. Poor referring was definitely a point that was covered. 
 
If you look at how poor the refs are in the PL then it’s logical to suggest they’ll only get worse the lower the standard.

Upon the decision against Ipswich most of their fans agreed they’d gotten away with one. But said they’d had that many stinkers that it was their turn to have some luck. 
 
Think we’ll see plenty more blunders from refs next season. But ultimately the best two teams will get autos regardless of decisions. The cream always rises to the top and so on.

[Tyler Durden]

It's not the crapness so much if that's a word which is the issue for me it's the total inconsistency shown over 90 minutes like they have a memory span of a goldfish.

They'll give a foul for one reason then a few minutes later ignore the same act which they gave a foul for earlier.

That's what's so infuriating. You may as well not have a ref and allow each of the teams to deal with the decisions themselves. 

[Loftyhites]

Ref Watch on Sky was quite interesting this morning. Usually Dermot Gallagher is diligent in defending his fellow referees but couldn’t justify the referees decision regarding Davies yesterday. He said that it wasn’t even a foul!

Regardless of referees though, we finished where we deserved in this division and another year here won’t do any harm. I’ve quite enjoyed this season.

[Sparkle]

I can cope with decisions going against us but what is unacceptable to me has been the the decisions awarded against where there is simply nothing to discuss - not even any physical contact at all - now the players are to blame because they are nothing but cheats and they will forever know that they are cheats, it’s not simulation because it doesn’t exist in the rules it’s cheating and I want those players shaming every week with at least the same punishment as violent conduct 

[Guest]

3 minutes ago, Tyler Durden said:

It's not the crapness so much if that's a word which is the issue for me it's the total inconsistency shown over 90 minutes like they have a memory span of a goldfish.

They'll give a foul for one reason then a few minutes later ignore the same act which they gave a foul for earlier.

That's what's so infuriating. You may as well not have a ref and allow each of the teams to deal with the decisions themselves. 

Yes - the inconsistency is the worst aspect of any of it. Inconsistency between games is bad enough... inconsistency within the same game is just not good enough.

That said, I don't know if we really have two camps here about yesterday (certain penalty vs. never a penalty) and as @ilkleyram says, it would be great to go back to a pre-cheating age, but the players know how the game is these days (including the inconsistency) and I still say in this day and age, for the sake of consistency as much as anything else, it was a penalty (even though Johnson went over far too easily) and I'd want a penalty and a red if it had happened against Derby. To me the Forsyth non-penalty mentioned in this thread is a different scenario. Maybe it was a penalty too but I'm not sure how it would be a red card.

The Lindelof handball mentioned was incredible - it's almost as if the officials are deliberately messing with our minds! On a bit of a tangent, does anyone remember Darren Bent going clean through at Wolves a few years ago, taken out by Danny Batth and not even so much as a yellow for what should have been a red? (Or was that just a nightmare? I think it was in the season where we didn't even make the play-offs after being in the top six for the whole s... OK maybe now's not the time...)

[angieram]

4 minutes ago, Sparkle said:

I can cope with decisions going against us but what is unacceptable to me has been the the decisions awarded against where there is simply nothing to discuss - not even any physical contact at all - now the players are to blame because they are nothing but cheats and they will forever know that they are cheats, it’s not simulation because it doesn’t exist in the rules it’s cheating and I want those players shaming every week with at least the same punishment as violent conduct 

When a red card is rescinded because a player dived/simulated injury, that red card should be transferred to the player who has conned the ref. 

Would Marvin Johnson have gone over so easily yesterday if he thought it might cost him his shirt in the first leg of the playoffs? I think not. 

[Carl Sagan]

11 minutes ago, angieram said:

When a red card is rescinded because a player dived/simulated injury, that red card should be transferred to the player who has conned the ref. 

Would Marvin Johnson have gone over so easily yesterday if he thought it might cost him his shirt in the first leg of the playoffs? I think not. 

This is a great idea. But, like it, there are so many obvious ways to cut cheating out of the game, and none is implemented. I don't understand why the football authorities are so reluctant. Although, when they make so many terrible decisions even with VAR support, maybe they realize they're simply not competent to make these calls either. It's all a sorry state.