Phew! Good of you to post back, otherwise we'd have send search parties. When I read your times and experience of your group, I couldnt just admire. I am gob-smacked that you decided to undertake the vent session - could not have been easy to bring up the courage, esp as you also reveal your counselling. The responses in this thread seem to be doing its virtual couch bit then. I know it helps me to regain focus and get back in the zen-mode. Well, we'll re-visit this in a few months. I am certain you will find a way to do what is appropriate.
A referee was talking to me about his experiences when he was refereeing in the Washington DC area. As he told it, one league would rent RFK Stadium (yes, that long ago) and play their games there all day, one after another. He was in the center for one and his AR had a crew cut, high and tight, so it was obvious he was a Marine. During the game, the referee looks over for his AR on that side and doesn't see him. "Where's Joe?" It turned out that a spectator hadn't liked an offside decision by the guy. The spectator had yelled "Why don't you go back to Beirut?" (Those with long memories may recall the bombing of the Marine barracks in Beirut, with a lot of casualties.) Joe went into the stands and beat the pulp out of the guy. He'd been the exec at that barracks until the day before the bombing.
Brooooooo. This, ok, while I don't condone violence, this is my new favorite story. what kind of a piece of crap yells something like that?
Yesterday, Miss Manners (similar to Dear Abby) stated in response to a letter, that she was amazed that "many people who are against rudeness are in favor of violence."
I guess they don't want to be rude before they go whack someone. Or as we hear from players, "Don't I get a warning first?" My son does after school care (I know. four degrees and he's doing day care) and the "nasty" insult that some of the kids will yell at each other is "You're rude!!!!"
40th game of the HS season, probably my last of the season because of availability, and the first and only one to go in this category. Good hard-fought high level boys 1/4-final, I'm rodeo clown. Visitors go down 1-0 in the third minute, and that's where it stays. Both teams play well and hard and center does a terrific job. But the visiting coaches will not shut up. They complain about everything. Every call, every non-call, every "delay," not enough game balls, even when they get the call it wasn't quick enough. Yak yak yak. Not quite enough, and after the first talking-to, not loud enough for the center to address it, but man it was a PITA. And I was bad again. Shortly after the start of the second half, they start up again, and I say, "Y'know guys, if you complain about everything, it's the same as not complaining about anything." "Oh you're a great philosopher. A great philosopher, just like Aristotle." Sigh.
When I am "bad", I usually complain about their coaching. "You know...if you guys ran a 4-3-3, you might stand a chance"....or similar.
Yeah I was tempted to add "And if y'all spent as much time talking to your players as you do to the referees you might be winning this game," but my better self prevailed and I refrained. Come to think of it, they did yell at their players about the same, and to similar effect, including producing some unhappy snapbacks from some of them. In contrast, the winning coach was very quiet and contained.
I tried finding where this latest video about referees would fit in, and figured this thread may work - there is a point about the purple shirts initiative and the caveats associated with it (paucity of support being one of them)
Well...let me tell you. It was one of those matches where I shed a whole lot of blood, sweat and tears. I fought them on the pitch....I fought them in the stands....I fought them in the parking lot! I never gave up!!
I often have to refrain from quips like that, but last night in an adult match, guy's complaining then asks, "Have you even seen a soccer match? Have you?!" I rejoined, "Well, I have a state championship trophy on my shelf at home, so I saw that one. How about you?" Playing with fire, but in this case the guy shut up for the rest of the match. (I coached a U15G team to a state cup title a few years back.)
Had two Men's Division 4 matches yesterday (solos). It was a really strange situation. I felt decent about my calls, but half the players thought I was the worst ref they'd ever seen, and another half seemed to genuinely like how I was calling the game. One player came up after the game and told me he was going to recommend me to the league for more games. I get that usually a couple players aren't happy, but the divide in these games was so stark. Definitely makes me want to quit doing adult games.
I think my unhappiest moments as a referee have been low-level adult men's solos, and that's exactly the reason - it's just a lot of uncoordinated bitching (like everything else) that just brings me down. I can't just let it go like some referees can, I guess, and I'm not sure I really want to. I haven't done those games in a couple of years, even though it would be easier on my schedule and I would enjoy just being outside. I'm happy to do higher-level adult games with full crews.
Our men's league is full crews for open and O-30 but the O-40 2nd and older get (and pay for) one referee. When I started, years ago, only Open 1st division got AR's. One of my prouder moments was doing a men's open game, Anglo v. Hispanic, with no cards and no injuries, solo. Yeah, they want to express their opinion but, for the most part, I just consider it information about the type of stuff that they're most concerned about. E.g. yesterday's men's O-50 2nd division. Early complaining about offside, so I knew that these idiots were trying to do an offside trap with no AR's. So I positioned a bit more to see offside and they stopped complaining so much, even when they disagreed. I also got lucky that I caught two well off the ball incidents, a semi-accidental trip and a push done with the elbow, that seemed to convince them to not do stuff just to irritate the guy they were marking. By half time, they settled down and decided to just play soccer. Like white taking a shot from inside the penalty area, red keeper dives and knocks it away, to a different attacker, who immediately takes a second shot, which bounces off a defender standing on the line, right to a third attacker who also takes a quick shot and has it bounce off another defender standing on the line, who clears it. Both teams were laughing at their ineptitude. "Welcome to old guy soccer!" After the game, one of the players comes to me with a smile and says, "We yell at you, but you do good game."
I sometimes do 7 v 7 O-30 mens league games. 50 minute games, three in a row. There are about 8 teams in the league, and by the end of the season you have seen everyone too many times. No one ever commits a foul, everyone is always fouled when they have the ball. They once had top level skill, now they can’t run a back/forth on a small sided field. Usually, for some reason, the ‘keepers are all really good. But, the abuse is really not very pleasant. And my comeback line is “If I wanted to get yelled at, I would have stayed home with my wife”.
This sounds just like our local winter indoor session, except we don't have rosters, and the same person might play in all three games because the following teams are short players. Everyone knows everyone else, and knows who they like and don't like, and for the most part they all know they have to go to work the next day, so it's not too bad. But every now and then, an alpha dog has to show their teeth. Mark.
No wife here, but a slightly psychotic dawg; I come home to lots of barking. These lines are just too hilarious. However I wonder how it would go what with everyone being so sensitive now-a-days, being offended left and right? It being - if i wanted to be barked at, i'd have stayed home.