Some referees in the NFL are wearing first-person hat cams. What about refs or linesman in soccer doing the same thing? It would be interesting to see what they see on offsides calls and such. Soccer coverage hasn't changed much in fifty years, and some new camera angles would be interesting, especially on replays. Maybe the refs would come under more scrutiny, but I think that often that if fans could see what the ref or linesman saw, they wouldn't be so upset when a (seemingly) bad call is made.
Hell - it would be cool just for replays and different angles for us at-home viewers. Course, soccer refs don't wear hats.
Another neat idea might be to adopt something I've seen in top-level rugby, where the center official wears a wireless mic pack, so that fans at home can hear what he's saying to the players.
Wouldn't the linesman-cam provide roughly the same angle as the sideline track cam? Just wondering. Aside: hat-cam - reminds me of that episode of the Simpsons when Homer goes into the Qwik-E-Mart wearing a 50 LB cowboy hat/hidden camera.
There have been a couple if times when referees have been hidden microphones to hear just what players say to them (they swear, who'd have thought it?). One example was a premiership match but another was for a series when for some completely unknown reason ITV decided to show Sunday pub league division 7 or something, literally the worst standard they could find. After sending a player off the referee turned to the camera gantry and said for the benefit of the viewers at home "I sent number 7 off because he called me a c*** and he called my linesman a F****** C*** as well". They could have an Arsene Wenger-cam to see just what he is looking at when all the Arsenal player's red card-worthy incidents take place.
The fans at home? Who gives a ************ about the fans at home? I don't think this would be a good idea. First of all a camera never shows the same thing that the ref's eyes see. I can hardly imagine that the footage would show anything not resembling a 9.5 earthquake with all the running around. Besides, usually the fans see things better than the ref (better position). But it's not only about bad reffing... it's about supporting your team. That means that you get upset at the referee whenever he sees a foul by your team or doesn't whistle when you think he should (even if you know he might be right). So it wouldn't work at all.
Yeah... too bad isn't it? Anyone else have any BS ideas on useless things that football doesn't need? In Milan they had people walking around the stand selling drinks and food... so forget about that cos they already came up with that terrible idea in Italy! Don't even mention handing out little plastic flags for the people to wave around with. We already have it. Who needs flares and other pyro when you've got those great atmosphere makers??? Well... let's see. We could try something like ehhhh... MASCOTTES... and CHEERLEADERS... YEAH!! GIMME A A GIMME A J GIMME A A GIMME A X AJAX WHOOOOO! Again! Again! Again! And we could have this really cool mascotte. Nope... we already have that at our European Football League drama... the Amsterdam Admirals. Man... there must be something we can think of to amuse the people while they are bored stiff with this whole football thing going on. They hardly even score!!!
What's so bad about that? We've been doing that in the states for a century now. In fact, some vendors have become well known and popular among fans.
Cheerleaders and mascots are used in leagues all over Latin America. Somehow, the fans are still knowledgable and passionate about the game, too. I've also read the occasional amusing piece about mascots in places like England (gasp). In some lower division league, the linesman called a play offside because he thought the mascot running down the opposite sideline was a player on the attacking team. So I suppose some people have problems with mascots. And l want a hat camera.
It's fine for US Sports. I'm revolted by the idea. It doesn't fit into my football experience. Besides I'm quite sure they would get robbed over here. Now that would be funny. Maybe it's not that bad an idea after all.
Re: Re: Hat cameras Yup. Every time I've seen the view from the hat cam in the NFL, it's on the official who stands about 8 yards behind the line of scrimmage on the defensive side... basically, the one who does the least running, but who occasionally gets cleared out by a tight end or a running back trying to slip between zone coverage. Since Referee's assistants in soccer are supposed to run, and since they'd be turning their heads (in theory) to see the relationship between the pass and the forward receiving the pass, I don't think we'll see hat cam anytime soon. And if we do, we'd probably call it "Nausea Cam" before too long.
Yet you still fail to explain what's so inherently wrong about it. After all, in a game like football, unless you have aisle vendors, if you have an incredible thirst building up, it's either miss part of the game to get a drink, or be forced to suck it up until halftime when you can get up and wait half an hour in line to buy something. Besides, don't many EPL teams also have aisle vendors? It's not unique to the US.
Mmmm...carne asada... In some Latin American stadiums, they have vendors pushing around fully-equipped carts on the lower tiers (lots of space for standing, walking around, pushing carts around, etc.) selling all sorts of hot food. Just like at bus stations and festivals and whatnot.