The Referee’s View: “It’s making him feel like giving up as a Referee”

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BECOME A PATRON

The life of a refereeing mother and wife involves many miles travelling to watch school rugby through a camera lens, recording the events of the match by video or by photograph, in doing so you also absorb a wealth of information about the attitudes of players, coaches, parents and other spectators by hearing their shouts and opinions of the game, which are commonly directed towards the Referee.

It means you are present at any game as a neutral spectator, the score is by the by, but it is easy to know which team is winning from the shouts emanating from the touchlines. The vibes can be quite fluid but they can also be intensely focussed depending on how well-matched the two sides are and sometimes the results can be shocking.

Referee abuse is a common theme even in National newspapers just now; Societies, clubs and schools are all talking about it, but nothing seems to be changing. Appalling abuse has been shouted at referees, at one game recently the parents encroached onto the pitch, told the Ref that they would tell him whether the lineout was straight and, when a fight broke out, one ran onto the pitch to join in. The referee had already had to stop the match to ask the parents to stop shouting at him and at the players to incite dissent in his decisions. Eventually the coach forfeited the game, with no apology to the Referee for the supporters’ behaviour, and most players failed to shake the Referee’s hand, or the more common post-Covid ‘fist-bump’, at the end of the game.

It is all too common, players have been heard verbally abusing female Referees and reducing them to tears. A coach posted live videos of a Young Match Official on Twitter with sarcastic and derogatory comments about his performance, parents have been heard encouraging their children to criticise a Referee’s decisions. There is absolutely no question that the amount of abuse from supporters, players and coaches of any one team has a direct correlation with the numbers on the scoreboard. The Referee is seen as an easy choice when someone on the pitch or sideline wants to apportion blame.

This is not the Gallagher Premiership, this is school rugby. There is no TMO available, there may on occasions be Referee support in the form of qualified Assistant Referees, and they may even be using a comms kit to advise the Ref on decisions, but this is rare. To find one Referee for a game can be difficult as there are simply not enough of them available; to find three is highly unusual. So that leaves the man or woman, boy or girl in the middle, by themselves. Nobody can see everything, hear everything or make the correct instant decision.

I decided to write this article as an appeal to anyone who spends time at a school rugby match. Spare a thought for the child who is cringing at the behaviour of the mouthy parent, the child who has to see his fellow players and coaches at school every week and who does not want to be known as the one with the notorious parent, let alone the notorious coach who is also his parent.

Spare a thought for the parent often standing on the sideline with a camera whose son is experiencing verbal abuse from players, parents and coaches yet again, well then that would be me. I am a Referee mum, and a Referee wife for that matter, and I can tell you that having driven hundreds of miles to take my son to and from matches, only for him to be shouted and sworn at, abused on social media, and blamed for the score not going in favour of one team or the other is making him feel like giving up being a Referee.

Just take a minute to imagine your son or daughter out there in the middle, on their own.

SHARING IS CARING!
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