Yeah I might look into it. I'm hoping that it's just some soreness coming off of being a lazy bum when I had covid, and that taking time off here at the end of the year with a lot of icing and compression will fix it. Oh yeah absolutely with stretching. I remember getting extreme groin soreness from doing too many side stepping as an AR. In fact this was the first issue that I got after covid too. My legs have basically fallen apart. But I do stretching of achilles, groins, quads, hamstrings. I think my bum laying around was too much for stretching to overcome.
I've learned the hard way that as you age, the less strength training you do, the more susceptible you are to injuries like this. I work a light load in large part to protect my tendons. Maybe one year, I'll do enough PT to feel up for more four-game weekends.
I had one of my Achilles flare up on me this week. Felt fine Tuesday night, then started hurting yesterday. I find that usually just making sure I get a little bit of jogging in before a match prevents problems. Unfortunately sometimes it starts hurting out of absolutely nowhere (like putting on socks in the morning). I usually do some heel drops on flat ground throughout the day when I'm having problems. And of course rest is good, but that can be hard for me to find during high school season.
I did a HS game this evening and one of the ARs is a guy I have done a number of HS games with and some club games as well, so I expect to trust him. Ball shot on goal, keeper clearly inside the goal running towards goal line to punch it out, obviously going to be a close call. Keeper punches it out and picks it up and play is continuing. I see the AR running up the line, ok no problem we are playing on. Then he starts pointing his flag at the midfield/touch line intersection while running. I know he's signaling a goal, but now I have to go talk to him. Why do they have to do these things
I was doing mentoring a few months back and after an obvious goal, the AR did something similar here and pointed the flag (and the non flag hand too) back toward midfield. I knew it was their first, maybe second game. Made a note to ask about that after the game. The reply back? “Oh that’s what they taught us to do at the field session.” Sometimes, we are our own worst enemies…
As bad as that was, look at all the fans that *didn't* rush the field and join the mob. I kept expecting to see the entire side of the stands on the field similar to after some college football games.
what is said and what is retained in training are not always the same. This very well could have been an AR using what they talked about as R while being an AR. (I’ve been amazed at some of things ostensibly taught or not taught and training I have been teaching at.)
The problem is that this mechanic is only described in the guidelines for match officials section of the LOTG, so no one reads it. What's so frustrating about this missed mechanic is how bad it makes the crew look. Have to stop the game, everyone in the stadium looking at you. Looks like you and your AR have no communication, "how can he not tell what his AR is calling?". And then when you make your decision, usually it results in having to have some conversation with players/coach where you have to try to avoid throwing the AR under the bus. It's so terrible.
While I know it normally doesn't happen a lot, I actually spend time going over this mechanic when I instruct new grassroots referees. Not only does it effectively communicate the most important event in a soccer game (and one that doesn't really happen a lot), if you do it right it just looks cool as hell. Personal story about this - Several years ago, I was running a line for my son's U11 game since one AR no-showed. On my goal line, I had a play where the other team's keeper "made a save" after the ball had crossed the goal line in the air. I was right on the line, and immediately had my flag up and then charged up the touchline to sell the call. My mom and dad were at the game watching their grandson, and this happened right in front of them. After the game, my dad - who knows nothing about soccer except that his grandson plays it a lot - even commented on how sharp I looked with that mechanic. So when we do field sessions, I spend the time to make sure my students know that the right mechanic to signal a goal.
I teach a lot of AYSO Regional Referee classes. That’s the entry level class for “real” soccer. (There is a separate class for 8U with no keepers, no Os, etc.) The class includes an outdoor session focused on signal mechanics. But the reality is that for folks taking that intro class, it’s like trying to drink from a fire hose. There is so much to learn in one day. If I were to guess, based on the mentoring I do, it would be that fewer than half remember the AR signal for a goal by the time they get onto a field in an actual game. Knowing that, when I have newish ARs, it’s part of my pregame—and includes “and If you’re standing still, it means you have something to tell me before I award the goal, and I’m going to come running over, so please make sure you start moving up the line if you believe it’s a good goal.” The only real way new refs/ARs learn on field mechanics is by getting tips from experienced folks they work with.
The key to this mechanic is to make sure the CR is looking at you while the flag is up! If the CR just sees you running up the line, he may think you are just following the play!
JV match yesterday, 6-1 white, 2nd half. I have called #13 white offside 5 times in roughly 20 minutes. I'm not paying much attention. I look up, play is on the far side, #13 is in an offside position, ball is coming towards him, I pop the flag. Center blows the whistle. Not a popular decision with the white bench. "NO OFFSIDE ON A THROW IN!" Oh shit. Center comes towards me with a "WTH are you doing" look. I say, "if that came from the throw in I am going to feel really dumb." He said, "Yup ... did you see another touch?" "Nope, I just blew the call." Well, crud. As I walk back to my position I look the coach in the eye and tap my chest. He nods and everyone moves on. Never done that before. No excuses, just zoned out for a second at the worst possible time. Sigh.
One of the first U19 games I did, I made that mistake of calling "offside" on a throw-in. Fortunately the center paid no attention to my flag and play went on - but the coach asked why I was calling offside on a throw. I simply didn't realize those guys could throw the ball so far.
I've been pissing away a few hours the last few slow end of year days at work making my own laminated score sheet on index card. Want to use a regular sharpie instead of a pen/pencil, not waste paper, not carry a wallet. Making two sizes (3.25"x5.25" and 3.5"x5.5"), the front is going to be orange with the game info, team info and scoring, while the white back will have the misconduct, so there's plenty of space for both. Been meticulously adjusting the table sizes, column/row width, font size, etc. to get it exactly right. Yes it's a waste of time. Yes I probably will stop using it anyway. Yes I can buy/waste money on the premade ones, but it's fun to make. Today right before I was about to laminate it, after all this time, I realized that I have all the game info (time, date, league, location) on BOTH the home half and the visitor half, which deleting from one will free up more space for relevant stuff. So now I gotta redo the sheet tomorrow. What an idiot!
It does. The problem with sharpies is that if the card is already wet, it won’t write well. When things are wet, the only reliable writing instruments are pencil and pressurized ballpoint.
The so called space pens will literally write completely under water. I keep a space pen and a waterproof notebook in my bag to use when it is really raining (which for me in Southern California is quite rare between our weather patterns and grass fields generally not permitting play in the rain).
Well I had a first. I had to terminate a HSGV at HT. The field was unsafe. It was a slippery mud pit and no one could stay on their feet. What grass there was, was moving on top of the mud underneath. The coaches didn’t want to quit but the home AD was supportive and agreed 100%. He had a football player go down with an ACL on that field under similar conditions earlier in the year.
why would you need game info on this if the whole reason is to have a reusable form and I presume you are transferring the info to the game report after the match?
Eh just felt like it needs it. It is small enough that it won't create much extra writing space to remove it anyway. I was scheduled for Mon-Wed HS games at my local HS, it was going to be great as long as it didn't rain. But apparently due to all the storms the past week here, the turf field is "unusable" because all the cork somehow flooded to the touchlines and has left most if not all of the playing surface as basically just astroturf on top of dirt and concrete. Obviously this is very unsafe, but it's ridiculous. Tonight wasn't raining., would have been a nice evening for games.
"the cork?" There isn't supposed to be cork in/under a turf field. Turf field start with a concrete box, with drain holes at the bottom of the walls. You then fill with gravel and, layer by layer, smaller gravel, until you lay the carpet on top. Once that's in place, you add the "Nike grind" (which, these days, is just ground up tires. Shout out to Liberty Tire Recycling.) The level of the fill is based on whether this is a football or soccer field.
Not sure if you're being pedantic about phrasing I used or don't know, but cork is a new field base they are using for turf, it's not all just black rubber anymore, which is good, because rubber is absolutely horrific. The new fills make the field way cooler and aren't as filthy as rubber. I think they use cork, semi-sand type stuff, not sure of others but those are the two new things I've seen