I just saw a video of this tactic being coached...it's going to be an issue for all of us very shortly.
For lack of any other place to put this, the 2nd letter in the post is of interest to this community,(the 1st is a good one as well). And the answer missed by not adding "Become a ref." https://slate.com/advice/2024/10/parent-advice-travel-youth-sports-coach-behavior.html Cheers, Mi3ke
Last weekend, college women's game. I'm AR2. I've got the visiting team's parents behind the fence behind me. I hear one mom loudly say "That's a handball!" I immediately hear another woman's voice "If you want to make the call, be a ref!"
to avoid an impeding offense, there is no requirement that they be playing the ball,only that they be in playing distance. (On these shenanigans, I will certainly not be generous is measuring playing distance . . . )
This part doesn't get enough coverage on the blame game: "Small infractions, left unchecked, can grow over the course of a match into larger outrages; to some extent it’s the responsibility of adult coaches to make sure to police their own players and sub out kids who are letting their emotions or their bodies get away from them."
Easy solution for the referee, call obstruction on the player furthest away from the ball. Find a foul going out. Attacking team still wastes the time (maybe not as much as they want to, but oh well) and the Defending team isn't going to score on an indirect free kick restart from there. You might get a few raised hands like "what did you call?" but the play is likely to get restarted pretty quickly so everyone starts playing again, especially so close to the end of the game. Wait, HS BV isn't real soccer? I always thought every HS game was the World Cup Final.
But...the only problem...you do need the attacker and defender together in order to find your obstruction call. By the time that happens and with the defender coming with speed into "the wall" from 9 yards away, you will have a mess on your hands. You have a pretty good solution, but we can't make up rules in order to prevent something that is very clearly against the spirit of the game.
I won't say that I now agree with myself, but, when a team tried to pull this late in a high school playoff game, I whistled and pointed out. "What's the call?" "Dangerous play. It's dangerous to the player standing there with the ball." I got no further complaints. I've seen too many times that the opposing player(s) come charging in, trying to get to the ball with a slide tackle. 'lead us not into temptation.' Like I say, I'm not sure I'd do that again, but that day on that field, it worked and they stopped doing it.
Sometimes a simple laugh and a "come on, really?" while you jog away to set up at the drop zone is all you need.
I probably should have said "furthest attacker covering the ball", but you understood my point. However you get there, just find a reason to blow the whistle before you have a broken leg cuz someone does something stupid.
Michael Stallone of Floral Park charged with assault for allegedly assaulting 11 girls at soccer game, authorities say – Yourlondoncalling headline is wrong...he only smacked the one U12 opposing player. so um...who said that you could actually enter the field of play in the first place, bone on bone tackle or not???
UPSL D1. The center did three 9v9 rec centers that morning, a state league 9v9 center and a 9v9 SCCL center that afternoon. At halftime of the UPSL game, he tells me he has "hit a wall, and I'm too tired to finish." He does finish, but barely went outside the center circle. I'm 4O for the first half. AR2 iced his legs and borrowed my IcyHot. Likewise, he was AR for all five of those games. This was his first UPSL game, having never ARed a 90-minute game before. In the 60th minute, he and I swapped positions. The CR always bites off more than he can chew. This was his second UPSL center. Hopefully his last for a while until he gets more U17+ games under his belt. I get wanting to move up, but sometimes you have to know your limitations.
You are doing a UPSL D1 game after having done FIVE youth games earlier in the day? To quote Judge Judy, "What are you, stupid?" One time that I was 4O for a USL Pro game, Kari Seitz was the referee. The two mooks who were the AR's had done a couple of U-14 games earlier that day. BIG mistake, especially since Kari's warm up routine was pretty much the equivalent of doing a half game. IIRC, the assessor mentioned their lack of fitness in the second half of the game and I don't think they got anymore USL Pro games.
I'm assuming this is the Georgia conference for D1 -- if so, I'm not surprised. I told him I was available but hey, guess I'm not there yet!
I've had that "Come to Jesus" talk with a few referees when they were a disservice to their evening adult game. At least once it was an assessment where everyone knew two weeks in advance it was an assessment.
I took the Columbus Day weekend off to travel out of state, visit some family, and watch my nephew's first "big" U9 tournament. I made it four minutes before I had to walk away from the parents and find my own corner of the field. I hadn't watched U-littles in a long, long time, and certainly have not refereed them in over a decade. We are throwing these brand new ref kids to the wolves. They are hearing things from the parents that I would dismiss a college coach for. I was actually looking around for a field administator or something, she wandered by and I mentioned it and she was like "of the six ten and under games we have going right now, this is the tamest." Then she asked if I reffed and if I could cover one of the 10 games they don't have assignments for (god no). The kid was doing fine. The parents wanted red cards for inadvertant handballs, they wanted him to call offside on players in their own halves, and god forbid someone actually fell down.
You really missed an opportunity there. Since you were a random out of town referee, you could have done one or some of the games and gone apeshit on the parents and you would face no repercussions. But actually, that’s disgraceful that the site administrator knows every game has horrendous behavior from the parents and just doesn’t care. As for throwing new refs to the wolves, that’s actually correct. Sometimes u12 and below games are solo refs, and frequently it’s newer teenage refs, and that’s worse than having them AR older age groups. And even the ones that are three person crews, you end up with a 15 year old center and 13 year old ARs which is bad as well. This summer I did a few u11-12 solo games in tournaments because the pay rate was decent, and the coaches and parents made it clear that they weren’t used to having a competent referee, or the coaches getting attitude right back at them and dissent yellows from the referee (me) when they yelled at me because it’s usually timid teenagers doing their games
We began a local mentoring program. Much of the funding for this year has come from 'zero tolerance' fines filed against clubs for ref abuse by players (generally not), coaches (sometimes, but they learn fast) and/or spectators. Fines were so 'successful' it will fund another season of stipends for mentoring new referees. It really has become a great feeling to be able to tell a spectator "you can continue to vocally disagree with me, but the next time its going to cost your club between $500 and $1,000.' A quick conversation with the coach and they will be in that spectator's ear telling them not to speak up again.
Fining teams and then using that for funding mentoring is a good way to turn abusive treatment into something positive. I was a proponent of abusive spectator behavior leading to sidelines being removed and then having all their fans be suspended for the next game or multiple games even if it’s just one parent being abusive, but you’re is probably better
I am a high school assignor who also assigns about 45-50 middle schools in my area. I have not had to cancel that many games this year even though i have close to 80 games a day and about 100 refs available. i get pretty creative on the middle school games and I can pick up a few USSF people who aren’t state certified to do games. I got a guy who is a referee to pick up his school’s games in a pinch. Last week, he wrote to say he was done and he didn’t care if I cancelled the rest of his season. He said the parents, coaches, and players were so disrespectful. THIS IS HIS OWN SCHOOL!!
Time for one of my recurring pleas to experienced refs to not put up with BS. Toss them that deserve tossing!!! Yeah you (and I) can take the abuse. We son’s toss them to protect ourselves or our egos—we toss them so maybe they learn what behavior belongs at a kids game and they don’t do it to a newbie ref who gives up on being a ref because of it.
Funny you mention that, on the way back to the car at the end of the day my wife asked how much they'd need to pay me to do those games (which were played in a 40 degree rain, by the way). I came up with $25,000 per game. I'm sure the kids were lucky to be getting $40.