Darn...I thought I invented that one! I run into the goal area on all goals as well, even if I know there won't be any trouble.
I agree with PH -- why? Don't do anything on the pitch without purpose. Sure, maybe it shows you have some fitness. But if there isn't a reason to be there, it's wasted energy and certainly not smart refereeing. Now, if there is a heap of players tangled up in the GA after an ugly goal, by all means do the fly by. It's just like going wide; don't do it just to do it, have a reason.
Because whenever I forget to do it, there is trouble. So I make a habit of doing it every single time, so I never forget to do it when it's actually critical. Maybe you and I (and PH) have different definitions of "run," and you think I'm sprinting hard and panicking in a situation where everyone else is just standing around and calm. The comments about fitness and saving energy lead me to draw that conclusion. I just keep moving when the ball goes over the goal line, until I'm sure it's safe to stop and look away. If that makes me "not smart," then so be it.
Unnecessary runs like this are quite often viewed as "showboating." Most top assessors do not like it. There are plenty of other methods to observe what happens without running into the goal area each time. You should be back-pedaling towards the center, unless there is a difficult situation to deal with. PH
I don't think it hurts anything moving to where there could be a potential hotspot. I might try it in a hotly contested game sometime just to see the reaction. I definitely like the idea brought up about what Webb did on the corner kick. Making himself seen among the players to prevent any funny stuff. Very proactive refereeing. If the ball is going to be a few moments getting back into play, I would really like to try it. I have a U14B Div II on Sunday. That's the highest level that plays in the spring due to HS player restrictions. I will probably try it then if conditions permit.
Me too- I guess it would be worth a quick mention in pregame: "hey if you see me enter the pa on a corner, I'm trying to preventively cool things down- hold the kick until I'm out." I'd hate to be on the six and have the ball come in.
Whoah. I don't think this is what it's about at all. If you're going to hold up a corner kick, you've got to whistle, isolate and address players. Make a production of it, just like every top referee in the world does, to have players stop the holding/clutching and broadcast your message. What Webb does, occasionally, is casually venture down closer to the goal and stroll about while the ball is being collected or if there is an otherwise natural delay. He then gets back out. He's lending his presence as a reminder. Soft power rather than direct intervention. But he's not holding a team from taking a restart that they want to take. You don't get to hold up a restart so you can remove yourself from a bad position that you deliberately placed yourself in (well, I mean, you could; but I hope the reasons that it is ill-advised are obvious). Also, for those on the "I want to try this at home" kick. Webb can do this because he's a 6'2" imposing figure who has done the World Cup and UCL Finals and has a relationship with almost every single player he's refereeing. This isn't to say it won't work for you. But to say your mileage may vary is probably an understatement.
I have seen a lot of referees come to grief by trying to imitate various things a top referee does, especially when dealing with players. It is important to grasp what MR says here. It has taken these guys many years to be able to do the things they do, it does not come overnight, even for Webb and Collina. I think there is a TV show where they say "Do not try any of this at home, we are trained professionals" at the start of the show. Perhaps they should say that for top level matches such as UCL semifinals! PH
Very different than just running into the goal area for no good reason after every goal, which was the subject I was addressing. PH
I'm usually in the PA and pretty close to the players on CKs anyway (being careful to ensure there is no one behind me or to my right). That has worked for me thusfar. I'm talking about if the ball is going to be a few seconds to be retreived from the woods or a fair distance away, and only if I felt it would pay dividends in match managment. If I were going to hold up a kick just to stroll in amoungst the players, I would consider it showboating. If direct intervention were required, that's a different story.
Ok. But most of my response was directly to chmwy, who said he'd add in his pregame to tell an AR to hold a kick if he was down close to the goal area. In both your posts on this, you are talking about situations where the ball is a distance away and a kick would not need to be held. That's different. And I don't think chmwy was implying he'd actively hold up a kick to do this. Just that, the way he envisaged it, it could be a needed result (hence his reference to his pregame). My point was that it should never be a needed result, which it sounds like you agree with.
I don't think that is proper positioning at all. Look at the old guides. In the PA is NOT one of the two suggested starting points. And you may have hit the nail on the head. It has worked so far, but the chances of you being in the wrong place when that ball comes in is pretty high. Stay where it is suggested. You can see far more, and also have a better starting point for the break out going the other way. There are times when I do position myself way wide of the post and in the area, but that is when I have an awful AR who I cannot trust.
Hopefully the feedback wasn't received as me thinking you aren't smart, I'm just making suggestions to make you smart-er. Here's what I've learned about proactive refereeing. Instead of reacting to an event, react to the precursors of that event. How this would apply with your example of melees after a goal is scored is to look for a mass of players in the GA, defenders feeling it's an "unjust" goal, an attacker going to retrieve the ball after an equalizer, etc. If those are present, get in there. Otherwise, you have other things to pay attention to. You have all the tools already. You (like myself) want to build habits so you don't miss this and that makes good sense. So all you're doing here is building a different habit, based on the indicators you observe. This is what makes you smarter, more efficient. It doesn't honestly matter at lower levels but you prepare on the easier games so the more difficult games go more smoothly. When you react to the precursors of trouble, there will still be several times that you do the fly-by and nothing happens. What makes it fun is thinking -- did nothing happen on it's own, or did your actions impact the players reactions?
My two cents: usually being in the PA doesn't sound like a good idea to me at all -- exacerbated risk of being caught in the wrong place -- and getting hit by a ball at midfield may be embarassing, getting hit by a ball (or inadevertantly blocking a player from being able to make a play) in the PA could be a disaster. But all positoning is flexible. Coming into the PA, or behind the GL on a particular CK to let players know you are there and watching can certainly be a useful tool in the right moment. While most of us can't use our presence the same way that HW does, I think all of us can learn ways that work for us to use presence near the players to defuse potential situations.
Because he's not an AR, he's an AAR. Please disregard my comment, I misunderstood your original statement