Strange Situations - Week of 5/3

See your other thread for my take.

Check the CD-ROM with Esse dealing with this subject. It varies depending on the circumstances. In U12-U14 give them plenty of chances to learn -- I would say in general warn them on the 2nd, remind them on the 3rd, and caution on the 4th. You don't need cautions in U10 unless the kid is just out of control, in which case get the coach's help first in pulling him out of the game. U14-U19 they know what a foul is, deal with it as you see fit.

Depends on the kid. If he was called for pushing before and you've given warnings in general in the past, maybe a caution is good. If the kid hasn't fouled anybody all game I wouldn't go giving a yellow just because you've warned in general. Everybody deserves a second chance at least.

Person who wrote it needs to be hung by his toenails and any league adopting it become unaffiliated to USSF.

Term is Assistant Referee, or AR for short. Also there is no "offsides" in soccer, that's only found in the game with the pointy-shaped ball. We have "offside" in our game. There's nothing wrong with ARs if they follow proper mechanics and make accurate decisions. Do the best you can with what you got.

I'm not a Mass ref but this is not permissible by FIFA nor USSF and thus any affiliated league doesn't have the option to enforce this policy whether they like it or not.

 

And I thought I was in a bad mood!

 

PZ,
Regarding Pt. 5, please don't tell me that you are allowing a club linesman to call offside.

I'd suggest calling your local assignor and ask for an assessment on the field rather than bringing things to a forum such as this for discussion.

If you want someone from outside your area, drop me a PM and let me know when and where you're working later this month and I'll see about getting down for an observation.

 

Sorry, didn't mean to convey I was in a bad mood or anything, those were just some quick responses to his questions I jotted down. I do have a problem with leagues that step outside the guidelines of USSF though with things like ZTP (now that I am aware of its existence) and temp expulsions.

 

"5. No linesmen. They flip every time for offsides, but from the angle (trailing the play), you can't make a clear call. What do you do?"

Prof, I assume you are saying that you are working solo and the defenders are constantly flipping their arms into the air to indicate to you that they think you should make the call. You've answered your own question when you go on to say "can't make a clear call." If you can't correctly make the judgment, you can't blow the whistle. The most you could do is remind both teams in advance that if they choose to live by the offside trap, they may well die by the offside trap. You can't be in all places at all times when working solo. If they have a problem with that, the teams need to go back to their leagues, tell them to stick a crowbar into their wallets, and pay for certified AR's.

 

I call dissent quite quickly after I tell a player to stop and he/she persists or immediately if it is particularly nasty...I don't put up with a heck of a lot on the field...not what I get paid for.

If I notice 3 fouls be or on the same player, the next one is going to get booked...just my rule of thumb.

I call the foul...generally the players get sick of all the restarts and reign themselves in. If it is pushing to stop an attacking play or to gain a goal scoring opportunity it could go right to a yellow. Depends on the severity and the reason for the push. Mild pushing can generally be expected in every game above the U14 level.

Sherman and I probably feel the same way about this. We have the power in the LOTG already to handle coaches/spectators.

I just warned a coach about his acting irresponsibly on the sideline yesterday in a Boys U16 match. He had the balls to tell me that according to the leagues ZTP, I was supposed to ignore him the first time...coaches think they have the license to zing the referees once a match...WTF.

No ARs are tough above the U14 level...best of luck, call what you clearly see and nothing else.

Dumbass rule which needs to be sent through the shredder. I asked my league president what I was supposed to do if the yellow carded team had no subs 2 months ago...no answer yet. BTW...our league says that the yellow carded player MUST be substituted.
Prof

Scott

 

I've got some situations -- not that require comment or anything, just seemed like an unusually high number of red cards this weekend.

I was refereeing National League Region II games in Madison Wisconsin this past weekend -- U17 Boys. In these games, we had the following situation...

1) A foul occurred in the midfield (literally in the center circle) -- red fouled white. The whistle blows and there is a little discussion between 3 or 4 players. The referee is about 5 or 6 yards away at this point and red player who originally committed the foul punches the white player in the jewels. White player drops like a bag of sand. Red player sees red and is asked to leave.

2) Players are setting up for a corner kick and suddenly blue player (attacking team) turns and delivers a straight right hand punch to the keeper's face. Referee and AR both see it. Blue player is shown red and asked to leave. As the blue player was coming past the AR, he comments to his coach that the goal keeper stuck a finger up his butt, so he punched him.

3) Free kick right at the top of the arc outside PA -- white kick. Red players are lining up in wall and a white player stands at the end of the wall. Referee (me in this case) sets the wall back at the penalty spot and tells the players not to start jostling or pushing for position. As I'm moving away, I turn to tell the kicker to wait for my signal and turn back just in time to see the white player haul off and kick the red player next to him in the ankle -- appearing to kick him just as hard as he can. Red player drops like a bag of sand. I show red and ask him to leave the area. He says, but he was standing on my foot.

4) First off, about 10 minutes into the game, the keeper fields a through ball. The attacker having every opportunity to run by the keeper with minimal contact, grabs the keeper's shoulder has he runs by -- the effect was to stand the keeper up and prevent him from a quick release which it appears was going to happen. I was AR and flagged it -- the referee blew the whistle and told the attacker no more. About 10 minutes later, another through ball. The ball bounces and the keeper has to jump to play the ball. He is near the penalty spot. The same attacker comes running in, jumps, raises both arms and crashes into the keeper. In doing so, he throws both arms down and into the keeper punching the ball into the back of the net. Referee shows red and asks the player to leave the area.

This does not even count the 3 other more "normal" reds. One a player was laying on the ground in the goal mouth, shot comes in low and he reaches above straight up (relative to his body) and blocks the shot with his arm. Another was a player taking down the attacker on a break away. The third was for a second yellow.

That's a lot of red cards for 18 games. Must have been something in the air.

 

To answer the questions quoted by Prof...

1) It's got to be pretty explicit or carry on after I've told them no more. I don't very often get too much but as far as the players go, I also don't have "rabbit ears" -- I don't go looking for it. I'm less lenient letting the coaches rant. As an example, a couple weeks ago a coach disagreed with a call. He commented 3 times that it was a "horrible call". I didn't react. Then he said "You're horrible." At that point, I told him that was enough. He made one more comment that it was a horrible call and I jogged over and said "Coach, I said it was enough, now you're formally cautioned. Let's not go any further with this."

2) I generally try to talk players out of PI. For example, yesterday, while refereeing a game between U17 boys, two different times after a player had committed a 3rd foul (non were bad fouls), I verbally warned them to ease up because I didn't want to have to card them for PI -- in both cases I didn't have any other fouls from them.

3) Pushing generally (but not always) tends to fall into the doubtful or trivial area of fouls. Most of the time, they're not even going to be called, but you might verbally tell the pushing player to ease up. If the fail to stop, then you start whistling them -- but only if it seems to be affecting the player with the ball. So if you assume that only about 1 out of 4 pushes even warrants a whistle it's going to take a LOT of pushing and more than one verbal warning before I'm going to start thinking PI.

4) Don't like them.

5) Prof, I've had it happen a couple times -- one was a high school age recreational league that was supposed to be done by 2 man crew and the other didn't show up. The other was a JV game where the 2nd official didn't show up. In both cases, I told them in the pregame -- "Look, I am still reasonably fast for my age, but there is no way I can be at both ends to call offside 100% accurately. I will move upfield as quickly as possible, but I am going to do the best I can from the angles that I have. I don't want to hear any dissent if you think I've blown it." I called it fairly conservatively -- basically, if he looked like he was TRYING to gain an advantage, I whistled him offside. Once when a player complained and pointed at someone -- I simply said -- if I was wrong, I'm sorry, but you heard what I said in the pregame -- I'm doing the best I can from my position. He said, ok, sir. You're right, sorry.

6) It's ok for a league to "suggest" it -- and if a coach requests it, I'll allow it. But don't think it should be required. This past weekend, I saw a referee do something unique. A player had a very hard tackle and got carded for it. About 10 minutes later, the player gets in hard again -- again just a little late. The refeee blew the whistle for the foul (no card) and told the player "Stay on the field, but go stand by your coach until he can sub you off at the next opportunity." I thought that was interesting.

 

Re: Re: Re: Strange Situations - Week of 5/3

Even though USSF doesn't provide for the sub, if the game is getting chippy and I think everyone needs to "relax" a bit, that's when I'll do the ceremonial type of caution. I'll loudly tell everyone to relax a second, I need to get this info down. I'll talk briefly to the offender and sometimes even to the guy who got fouled (commenting about not wanting retaliation, that sort of thing). Basically, just taking 30 seconds or so to take the air out of the game for a bit.

Sometimes it settles things down.