A little bit of back story. Tuesday night I was chewed out hard after my boy's derby game. My wife thought that I was waiting too long to whistle fouls and that is why players were getting frustrated. I thought that the game had been on a knife's edge due to the teams playing and my letting some stuff go. I don't get many opportunities to work with referees that are better than me or that can offer valuable feedback on my performance. I try to evaluate what I could do better, but the feedback that I wasn't quick enough on the whistle was something new. My question is this: How do you go about self evaluation after your games?
Don't get hung up on whether they are better than you or not. At every game, at half time I ask my ARs for what I'm missing or need to see, etc. (Yes, the newer ones are often befuddled by the question, but sometimes from the mouths of babes . . . ) I try to do the same after the game, but doesn't always happen. With respect to the specific item you mention above, do you talk to players? On a slow whistle without a quick restart, I'll often say something to the victim along the lines of, "You OK? I wasn't sure if you guys had an advantage developing, so I was waiting to see on that before I called it." The skilled players get that. And if they aren't at a level that they understand it, perhaps you should be whistling more quickly rather than waiting for advantage. YMMV.
What stuff starts to happen in games, I call cheap fouls. Slow the game down. But, about your original question....I think about games on the drive home all the time. I clearly remember stuff from my first year! I think most of what I think about and talk to other referees is positioning. How to get to where I need to be and quicker. Is there a better angle to take? How do I get that angle? And, I'm always telling myself on the way home that I Should have tossed the coach.
I try to stay humble, but it's hard. There are several refs that I work with that are very quick to the whistle. The majority of the work I've been doing for the past month and a half has been HS duals, so that can be frustrating. Especially when they are calling things in my quadrant. I tend to have a slow whistle, too. That can have advantages, and disadvantages. Like SoCal said, if you interact with the players and use you personality, whether it be waiting for advantage or something else, I think you'll have more success. One of the harder things in a dual is when I'm on the right side of the attacking half. When running with the offside line, my body's facing the goal line and I'm looking over my left shoulder. I keep the whistle in my right hand, so imagine.
I backpedal a lot in that situation. The good news is I can run almost as fast backwards as I can forwards. (The bad news is I can't run much faster forwards than I can backwards. )
At least you're still using the word fast - I can run the same speed in most any direction, none of them are fast
Mind you I'm using that word only in a relative sense – in much the same way as the words "moderate" and "civil" are used with respect to politics these days.
Something I always say as we meet at the half as well. Usually you get the "nothing" but if you pry a little and ask about an incident that was bugging you, they usually will give their 2 cents. I think it really helps give the younger AR's confidence as well. "If this old fart in the Center wants my help, maybe I do have something to offer." type thing. I have learned quite a lot in return as well. I still have pictures in my head of tackles from matches 10 years ago and wonder if I should've called or not.
Speaking of which, JA has a pretty good new writeup regarding same, here: WHEN IS A SLIDE TACKLE LEGAL OR ILLEGAL? February 7, 2016 Strike "pretty good;" I think it's very good.
I think it's vital for the ref team to discuss at half and full time what everyone can do better. Just as important to review critical decisions in your head afterwards, and talk them through with the ref team. I utterly discount non- referee feedback. I think we really need to be in a mindset that fans', coaches' and players' "guidance" really can't be considered. Of course I don't mean ignore. Dissent must be dealt with. Players' temperatures must be monitored. Coaches are sometimes even right. But these are things you manage, not things that you judge yourself by. In the game in question, you said it was a derby, was on a knife's edge, and players were perhaps frustrated by a slow whistle. Was there any boiling point? Were fouls callous and increasingly frequent? Were the players not sophisticated enough to desire proper application of advantage? Who chewed you out? If it wasn't an assessor, why do you care? If the only thing bad you can think of is that some idiot wasn't happy with you, then it sounds like it went pretty well. For myself, I always always feel there is room for improvement in even the easiest most casual game. I always try to read the game and be the referee that that game on that day needs. When I have laid the proverbial egg, it is usually because I was not mentally or physically prepared to be that referee. So, my self assessment is not about whether I got this or that right- that will be something forever imperfect and forever tuned. It's more about was i rested and focused before, did I avoid the trap of underestimating the level of the game, did I read the temperature correctly and let the game simmer but not boil over, did I man manage the hotheads and protect the skill players- did I do what I could do to let the game be as good a game as it could? I see gifted referees walk up and effortlessly do high level games that I would totally stress over and likely not keep up with. They are younger, fitter, and more understanding of the game than I ever will be, and I resent them! But to resemble them, I have to prepare mentally and physically.
As I read it, it was his wife. Personally, I always listen to my wife (even when she's yelling "Call it both ways ref!), and it's worked well for me for coming up on 33 years.
While fellow referees are much better at giving feedback than non-referees, when I reflect on my performance as a ref after a game (when I self-assess) I think about the non-referee feedback and I think I can learn from SOME of it. The vast majority is the usual griping and complaining and can be ignored because it is caused by frustration (the same holds true for comments during the games). Some of it is aggressive in nature and has to be dealt with cards, if appropriate. However, there are some comments and complaints that I KNOW I should listen to. There are comments from players and coaches that I know from previous interaction that they are reasonable; when they complain about a controversial call I should listen. The may be wrong, but I should check my ego and really listen. And then there is the situation when I can tell by HOW players complain that I probably have laid a proverbial egg. Having been a referee for quite a few years, I think I can tell the difference between the different kinds of complaining and can learn from some of it.
I don't have much to say about how to self-evaluate. The mistakes I made I will grill myself for, and that can last for days. If I did something really well that had a good impact, that will be on my mind also. I think the important thing is what you do with these items. I write them down, and look at my list often, and go into each match with a few specific things that I want to do more or less of. It could be something as simple as a goal of no offside situations where you don't notice the AR's flag and have that moment of shame when people have to yell at you to get your attention.
How? Write a recap of the game you called. Why you liked, what you would change. What the players reacted well to and the opposite. Etc. During a high pressure match, break things into bite-sized, five minute chunks. Reset often. Semi-forget that thing that happened. At least don't dwell on it. Bank it and move on. Be closer to play. Be more animated, more engaged. More talking. During play and when managing players. Check in with ARs EVERY stoppage. Find your "friend" amongst the players and engage them in casual conversation if it is likely to be well received. All the above if this works for you, on that game, on that day. If not, don't force it. Hang on for the ride and smile.
I had a bad last ten minutes of a good game yesterday, which caused me to remember the most important thing of all: every time you have a bad game, or make a huge mistake, remind yourself that the best soccer referees in the world -- every one of them -- was once never any better than you are today.
Heck sometimes they're worse today. (Well, at least on any given call.) That's why I watch BPL matches. "Hey, I could have missed that call just as well as he did."
I was coaching last week, my wife came out and rooted for the other team (She's an elementary school teacher in another district, her students were playing for the opponent).