I don’t have a personal encounter to go with this question but I was browsing a british Referee forum and saw this topic pop up a number of times. To what level do you take something accusing you of being biased or cheating for the other team, or being a “cheat”. Caution or send off? There is also the “take off the other teams jersey” comment which mostly comes from the parent section but what if it came from a coach or player? Would that rise to offensive and abusive or merely a caution for dissent? It seems to be more prevalent across the pond and most said this called for a sending off and shouldn’t be tolerated? How does it translate stateside?
Strictly speaking, being called a cheat is offensive language towards a match official. No matter where you are. Having said that, I've never heard that at any of the games I've been at here in Ontario, Canada, but I know people that have heard similar such comments, though definitely not with the prevelance that seems to be the case in the UK.
At the youth level games I do anyone who accuses me of being a cheat is gone. I've only heard it once though, from a spectator. At the pro level here fans can get away with saying nearly anything. Don't know about players and coaches.
I hear this all the time I feel. Usually from fans. I’ll ignore the fans until it becomes overly personal. Coach/player is getting written up though.
I tend to ignore it from the fans unless it's loud and persistent. Coach who says it loud enough for me to "hear" on the field is gone and gets an ass chewing for the benefit of the kids behind him on the way out.
I try to keep players and team officials in the match and try not to use cards but questioning my integrity does not stand. Question the call as right or wrong but not my motivation for making it. I am extremely far from perfect and readily admit mistakes, but they are mistakes with no forethought on who it benefits or harms and of never intentional.
U-17 boys game, State Cup round robin play and the game was actually meaningless because both were going to the semi-finals the next week. USL Pro head coach on one bench, D1 men's head coach on the other. Late in the game, when I gave his team a free kick in midfield, the former pops off with "Ref, you're a cheat." Dismissed. The latter coach said, "He should have been gone a long time ago." I hadn't heard anything before this but we did the whole dance of him wanting to stand at the gate to the field, etc., etc. He protested the "card" but got nowhere. He tried to keep me from doing his pro games but USSF told him, essentially, 'what's the name of your team? From where?' Now he's a MLS general manager, who holds the distinction of having been sent off as a player, coach AND general manager. Yes, he was dismissed as a general manager. Wow. If "you're a cheat" isn't insulting, what would they have to say for it to be insulting?
A flat out statement that the referee is cheating is hard not to see as OFFINABUS. The implicit intimations of that can be harder to deal with. My sense from a few years back reading a couple of British ref boards was that they went more quickly to send offs for the implicit statements of cheating than most American refs do, but were more tolerant of some other behaviors.
About a month ago I have a D3 game between 2 very low level teams. I think between the 2 of them they had 5 wins. Anyway, in about 32nd minute, I call a PK for the home team for an off the ball push in the back. I go to explain the call to the coach and he starts to argue that I can't make that call, etc. etc... at which point I tell him. "I gave you my explanation, we are done here." He still continues so he earns a Yellow Card. Just as I turn around to go and restart play, he screams "That's what you get with homer referees". I turn back around and show him a red card for his troubles. Anyway, the league commissioner was present at the game, plus the assignor was fully aware of what happened, they both backed me up on my decision.