I just ordered another jersey for me and I figured I'd start a casual thread to discuss about our jerseys at youth soccer level. As we know, there are 5 colors so a ref could have up to 10 jerseys, both SS and LS. I've done a whole year of reffing with only 1, short sleeve yellow jersey which I got as a starter kit, but after prolonging this for a while I finally got around to ordering an alternate. I'm getting a red long sleeve because as far as I understand, it's no longer required that we both have same sleeve length? Or is that something that I thought up for some crazy reason and is not true? So what do you guys have and what do you guys think a youth soccer ref should have? how many and what kind? I thought red would be the most widely used alternate so I'd go with that. In the long run I'll probably get a yellow long sleeve and another color - black or green maybe.
Your location and local teams should determine the order in which you buy jerseys for color. The long/short sleeve argument is something for the birds, but tis better to have a long sleeve and not match the short than a short sleeve with something showing under it as the sleeves. If you are an adult with an actual job, I have little sympathy for not having at least three colors after starting your second year. Kids I have much more leeway, but I think getting at least one jersey for every year you officiate shouldn't be that hard for a ref, that's about 5 games at most in order to make the payment. All this being said if you ever give up refereeing please donate your jerseys to local assignors or the state so that they can distribute them to other refs, or sell them yourself. Just don't hang them up and let them go to waste.
This is pretty much what I do. I am a college student, 19 years old, who's in the 2nd year of reffing now. So I decided I'd get one this year and then next one or maybe two the year after. Just depends on what will happen, but I'm trying to be serious about it so I'm gonna invest little by little in this stuff. Although from what I noticed there is no real hierarchy with my association - yellow is primary, but alternate are level, as far as they are concerned. And as for the local teams - you see quite a bit of red teams, but there is also a bunch of black teams and a bunch of blue so it's really difficult to say. Plus, we have a good amount of tournaments (Like Hempfield Fall Classic) which attract teams from all over the East Coast. As for the jersey - it costs $25 (economy version) so I reckon for the most part it's one game (at least here) for a jersey. Really not that much.
If you have a lot of red, black, and blue teams, I'd get a green. In my area green is almost the primary. We have a lot of blue teams in the area, so I generally only get to wear blue when I go out of state for tournaments. Find out what the other guys in your area have, and try to go with that.
Down in the south, that Black jersey is not really interesting. Gold first, the green, black, red,blue. Short sleeves first and put a long black UA under it to start when cold. By the time things like colors/sleeves/ matching matters, this is far in your mirror.
I ordered my second jersey lsat week and it should be here Monday or Tuesday. I had just got done reffing an 8 game weekend at a local tournament where in the finals, one team was yellow and the other was white. My CR asked my if I had any other colors (i'm just ending my second year now) but sadly yellow was my only option. Luckily, he is a local coordinator and experienced ref so he loaned me his green LS while the other two wore green SS. He said it didn't matter if the sleeves were different lengths. Realizing I needed another jersey i went home and ordered a green SS for $45 3 games to cover for. That stuff is so cool too! I ended up buying a new Fox 40 whistle w/ lanyard, a new USSF flip coin as i lost my other, a bag organizer to hold it all, and some write on cards as well. I plan on being a ref for as long as i possibly can!
Why is everyone wearing green? USSF said when it came out we would only need to buy it for upper-level tournaments like regionals. Has that changed?
We have very few green teams - and the ones we have are dark green. I can't think of a team I've reffed lately where I couldn't wear green. We have a lot of yellow teams - high schools and clubs. I l have all 5 long and short, plus a water proof yellow for cold, wet games. I'll wear it under other colors for extra warmth and water proofing. Most of the more experienced referees have 5 colors. I run into a lot of kids who just have yellow. I loaned a kid a short green or red (can't remember which) to wear over his sweat shirt at a tournament recently when we had a yellow team.
Green turns out to be a fairly effective choice, once your eyes stop protesting. Very few teams have green jerseys, and black, blue and red all tend to disappear in poorly lit night games.
I have three jerseys. Yellow, Black, and Green SS. I hope to get the last two colors by the end of the year (my birthday and Christmas is coming up ). Maybe end of this year or beginning of next year I will work on getting the LS. Luckily I have a local soccer shop that provides me 20% off all OSI gear. So I end up getting the Pro Shirts just under $40.
I have all colors long and short sleeves. Doesnt mean i have worn all the combos. I know for a fact the ls green is still in the bag.
This weekend I had seven games and wore every color but black (we don't really do black in Texas when it's warm). Wore green most of all (4 games) and yellow, blue, and red once. I have as of last week the current version of every color SS and LS, two sets of current logo shorts, 1 set of 2007 logo shorts, and one non-logo short for HS playoffs. I also have all the NISOA colors except black and whatever they're calling that new hideous color. It takes a lot of time and money but overall worth every penny to look professional.
Lucky you! I believe my local shops only sell the economy and although they are cheaper, they aren't my first choice because i've already lost a coin and dropped a lot of things out of those open pockets! I'll have to check them out though. Does anyone know if OSI sells shorts with a velcro or zipper back pocket? Or some way of keeping it closed? I'm thinking of getting a small velcro patch and adding it to the back pocket for my red card! I don't want to show that by accident!
http://www.officialsports.com/Shorts-Referee-Uniforms/b/3258496011?ie=UTF8&title=Shorts Pricey but it's OSI. I like them and you have to spoil yourself sometimes.
It will be added to the "save for later" list! Along with a nice under armor shirt to go under my jersey. I do enjoy spoiling myself! I'm just stimulating the economy, one dollar at a time.
I know that I may be staring an argument about buying OSI verses other brands, but unless you are doing higher level games, in my area it does not matter what brand you are wearing as long as you have a nice clean uniform. I personally have all 10 jerseys and not a single one of them is OSI. I got some cheep SS uniforms from amazon about 2 or 3 months into my refereeing career, http://www.amazon.com/Ace-Kick-Soccer-Referee-Jersey/dp/B003PJIC3A , hoping to replace them with the OSI when they ware out, but they are holding up extremely well so I doubt that I'll replace them any time soon. I referee between 25-30 hours a week and for the past year these uniforms show no signs of ware. I startet refereeing HS this year and I was told that I will also need some LS uniforms, so after researching them online, I decided to buy the Score uniforms. Granted they were a lot more expensive than the Ace Kick brand, but not as expensive as OSI, but they were the most cost effective option for me. I did not want to buy 1 or 2 from one brand and the rest from another brand. It's just one of my quirks I finally got assessed to G7 a few weeks ago and the assessor did not mention a single thing about me not having OSI brand. Sorry for the long rant but my humble opinion is that if you are just staring out buy what you think is right, you can always upgrade to the OSI uniforms whey you move up the ranks. Which I might do if I ever decide to become a State ref.
But logically, if starting out you buy OSI uniforms and continue to referee, you won't have to switch to another brand and re-buy all the jerseys. Isn't it going to save you money in the long run? Maybe my math is just sloppy this morning!
I didn't know any better when I started, well, I didn't know any different and ended up with the old style non OSI tops. I do not believe it makes any difference EXCEPT - like the wearing a hat discussion - it is expected to have the OSI new style (and to some extent the pro version) if you want to move up in refereeing. So when I decided to try to upgrade to 7 I took one tournament and purchased all 5 short sleeve and then my family got me all 5 long sleeve last Christmas. I can say that it will not matter what your uniform looks like if you have a terrible game, but showing up late, looking a mess, and the crew not matching can make a difference in an OK game as many will be predisposed to thinking you don't have a clue and will start from a lower point so the OK game goes to a bad game in their minds. Forgot this - the old style shirts I had originally are in my bag and have come in handy when working with younger refs who often have only yellow so we don't match old and new but do match in color.
You have a point, but in my opinion for most referees that are starting out, becoming a State referee is at least a 5 year journey. Unless of course you are one of the lucky few that get fast tracked. Who is to say that in 5 or so years OSI and or USSF decides to change the uniform design again, strongly encouraging us to buy yet another set of uniforms.
That is a good point. I just bought my second jersey so I think that if OSI does change, I won't be in the hole to badly. Hopefully they don't change anytime soon. I actually like the uniforms they have now, unless the new ones are way better, I'm not going to agree with the change.
1. Officially black is the alternative 2. For me, green ends up being the #2 color b/c of all of the red and blue teams as well as a large number of black teams now. 3. For sleeve length, choice for #2 shirt should be based on what the climate is in your area for the majority of your games. As for LS, it makes no sense to buy a long sleave shirt as your 2nd shirt if 80% of your matches are day games in 50-60 degree + weather. You can always wear a LS black undershirt on the cooler days. Additionally, the 1st LS shirt you should purchase should probably be a yellow LS b/c that is going to be the primary LS shirt that you wear in cold weather.
When did US Soccer come out and say there was an "official" alternative color. Unless my Admin Handbook is out of date this is how mine reads (emphasis mine): "The following four shirts have been approved by the Federation as alternates that can be worn in case of color conflict. There is no order of preference among the alternate jerseys. The other parts of the referee uniform (shorts, socks, shoes) do not change if the referee wears an alternate shirt. BLACK SHIRT with, BLACK COLLAR, and BLACK CUFFS (on long sleeve shirts only). RED SHIRT with, BLACK COLLAR, and BLACK CUFFS (on long sleeve shirts only). BLUE SHIRT with, BLACK COLLAR, and BLACK CUFFS (on long sleeve shirts only). GREEN SHIRT with, BLACK COLLAR, and BLACK CUFFS (on long sleeve shirts only).