I'm going to push back on this a little bit... Coaches aren't always focused on play on the field, and definitely don't watch the game the way a referee does. Coaches have additional concerns during the game beyond fouls, etc. For a coach, looking out for a player go beyond just whether that player is being fouled incessantly by an opponent. I don't think a question about a call is necessarily dissent. The coach may have been distracted or dealing with other issues. My boss plays and coached his kids teams when they were younger. He said when he was coaching he may be talking to a player, or other coach about the game and hear a whistle. He'd like to know what happened because he wasn't paying that close of attention. So, we should expect an occasional question, and they should be asked in an appropriate manner. We should try to answer that question appropriately, whether that answer is the guy on the far side of the field, or number 15. Most of the time, the coach shrugs, says "Oh, OK." And walks away. The easiest way to keep a coach out of your head is to not let him in in the first place. Get your focus on the game, not the coach. A coach can chirp out every now and again and not be an issue. If the coach becomes a distraction, starts taking your focus off the game, then deal with him.
Once in a while in a youth game my answer was, "All of them." I resisted the urge to add, "Because your back line is too slow, and their forwards are timing it perfectly and beat them every time."
I have, occasionally, responded to the demand from a defender, almost always the guy with his hand up, to know 'how isn't that offside' with something like "YOU held him on. You were ball watching." I have never had a guy try to tell me that he wasn't ball watching. The best times, though, are the ones where another defender then tells the guy that he needs to push up with everybody else. FWIW, these are adult men's games, not youth or high school.
Tangent to the offside discussion, on my Gr7 upgrade assessment match black played a very high line, like w/in 10 yds of the halfway line. I was concerned that the match wasn't going to count after the 8 OS call. On one memorable play, while tried to play a through ball with lots of pace, everyone knew the strikers were offside, except for me. I only realized after I was ten yards past the defenders, by myself looking for everyone else. We all had a good laugh at my expense. :-/
These are all fair points. I would add that I generally do have the information, I'm just done giving it. 99% of the time the question is less "I generally am curious" and more "I know who was involved, I just think you're wrong, and want to argue." I have reached my limit on having coaches disingenuously ask in order to argue, and getting no support from the CR. After being on the receiving end of a lengthy rant from a HS coach when I tried to explain why a player in an OSP but not involved in the play can become offside when the ball caroms off the post directly to him (a rule I know the coach knows, by the way), including the bench screaming at the CR to just ignore me for the rest of the game, I decided I was changing how I approached my AR duties. If I was AR1, at the start of each half I would give a (friendly!) heads up to the coaches and bench players to please give me space to move up and down the line (most of our fields are football fields surrounded by tracks, and the benches are wedged in between the tracks and the sidelines creating about 4 yards of space, total). From then on, I would say zero words to the bench or the coaching staff. None. I'd still talk to players on the field as needed, but I was just done dealing with the bench. It didn't matter if they asked nicely, or yelled, or anything. They were getting nothing from me. Most of the time they gave up and just moved on to yelling at the CR. Honestly, it made being AR1 a lot more pleasurable. Our HS assignor doesn't assign AR1 or AR2 (the CR just picks one, or someone volunteers if the CR doesn't care, or most often we do rock/paper/scissors if neither want it), so in the daily pregame discussion of "I don't want to deal with him, you do it" "no, you do it" I started saying "I'm willing to do it, but I'm not going to speak to the bench at all." I haven't had a CR yet who wasn't okay with that plan.
As an AR, I generally don't look at the numbers especially if they are far away from me. I look at which colors are ahead of other colors so often times, I cannot tell a coach which number kept someone onside.
I have to disagree with this. As an R, I almost always tell my AR1/4th to be proactive with the benches. If you can solve an issue with a coach before the R has to deal with it, isn’t that the best case scenario? If it goes over the top then you (as AR1) can always call your R over and then book him, but flat-out refusing to talk to coaches seems like you’re creating problems for the referee when you could be solving them.
Yes to all of that. But then there's the CR who leaves you twisting in the wind over there by the bench, notwithstanding all your pleas for intervention ...
Correct, this is 50% of the problem. If I have a CR I am confident will offer any kind of support at all, great. But in the past 10 years I could count the number of cards I have seen given to high school coaches for dissent or verbal abuse on one hand. And none of those were to the longtime worst offenders in the area. Like I said, the incident that precipitated my stance on this involved a 30+ year veteran, multiple state title coach standing on the touchline screaming at the CR across the field that I didn't know what I was doing and he was free to ignore me. The CR just looked at him and kept going. When I asked if he had heard that at halftime, the CR said yes, but that he knew I was right so I shouldn't worry about it. Thanks, bud.
Sometimes, I definitely know. If they've run the same backline the entire game, I know the numbers based on physical appearance or mannerisms. (I do some play by play broadcasting, so I have to do this in other hobbies). Sometimes, I'll clearly see the number before the moment of decision. If I don't know the number, I won't say it. But I have developed my offside recognition (and I admit, it's taken many, many games!) where I feel confident of being able to tell the coach number and/or position most of the time I'm asked about an onside/offside decision. In many cases, it does help defuse tense situations regarding close offside rulings.
I hope you let the assignor know about this center hanging you out to dry. One of the reasons ARs generally like working with me is that I will quickly deal with any dissent directed to them from the coaches. Last May, I was the center for a game with conference championship implications. Visiting team is winning 5-0 and on the way to winning an outright conference title. Close offside decision against the visitors, and the player starts screaming at my AR. I immediately step in and caution the player, which under Iowa rules ended his night since there was less than five minutes left in the match. Following the game, the AR thanked me for stepping in and dealing with the dissent. He said that a lot of centers won't do that. I told him I generally treat dissent against my ARs more harshly than I do dissent directed toward me.
Not sure how true this is, but i really want it to be true: our soccer ref didn’t show up so one of the moms on our team had her 9 year old son ref for us (he had a whistle) and a completely adult woman on the other team argued with one of his calls and he yellow carded her in front of everyone and she had to sit in her car to calm down— Jennifer McAuliffe (@JenniferJokes) December 21, 2019
I misread that until reading some of the tweet replies.... The "mom on our team" was a player that got her son to ref their women's rec league game - the arguing adult woman was a player that didn't like a handball call. I'm double lol'ing now!
I saw this on Brian Barlow's Offside page. I want to know who this kid is. If he's refereeing the 2050 World Cup final, I hope the announcing crew recites this story!
Well, yes as a coach, sure. I mean the point of "coaching" is to coach. If you have a player who keeps messing up the offside trap, does the coach need to know who it is??? Absolutely. How else is the coach going to coach his players, unless he knows who to coach? Now granted, if it's a problem for his team, it's incumbent on the coach to figure out who it is. Asking a AR or CR is one way to find out. But if they are not talking, then he'll have to figure it by watching the offside line exclusively. Depending on your ability, you may or may not want a coach doing that.
You mean like the assistant coach who stayed behind me as an AR, following me up and down the line? Yeah, that was annoying. And the rec league rules said that if a technical area was not provided, then it defaulted to the 18-to-18, so he was allowed to move as he did.
What genius came up with that ?!?!? AYSO (I think nationally, but at least where I am), makes it 10 yards from halfway line--conveniently the size of the center circle (and even more obvious on a football field).
So 18 to 18, in both directions? In other words, the coach of the team on the right can go all the way to the 18 on the left, and vice versa? Sounds like an opportunity for some testy interactions between coaches.
I would walk with the AR and raise my hand behind him when I saw an offside play. I was trying to show my mids they were late with the pass or show the forward they were off. AR thought I was criticizing him until I told him why I was doing it but he still asked me to stop.
Our rec league had teams and their supporters on opposite sides of the field. So yes, 18 to 18. I tried very hard to get our local rec association to paint technical areas - generally a line 10 or 15 yards on either side of the center line. It mostly worked ok, except for parents who thought that was where they lined up the legs of their lawn chairs. I did tell one assistant who was berating his keeper to stay in the technical area. For the rest of the game he made snide comments to parents, like, "This is my line. I have to stay behind it." But at least he wasn't getting down on the keeper any more.