Excepting the cleaner of Lee Cattermole’s bloodstained boots, there is no less envious job in football than that of the referee.
Whether the job is done correctly or not makes futile difference to the partisan crowds, who will en masse accuse of serial self-pleasuring the moment a throw-in is awarded to the other team. The players may not partake in such offensive chants yet their behaviour is rarely better, sarcastically applauding every decision that goes against them, surrounding the officials any time a team-mate impersonates Tom Daley inside penalty the box and in the case of Paolo Di Canio way back in 1998, even daring physical intimidation.
Managers meanwhile offer little protection; in fact, the performance of the man with the cards and whistle somehow becomes enthused with virtually every defeat in the Premier League, even when the margin between two sides is so great that even an official as corrupt as Gary Oldman in Leon the Professional probably wouldn’t have made any difference to the scoreline.
It must leave those involved in egg-chasing either mortified beyond belief or tearing at the seams with laugher when witnessing such abusive Premier League rituals. They may spend 80 minutes wrestling each other into bubbling pools of mud and occasionally instigating ad hoc boxing matches, but respect for referees is ingrained into rugby’s DNA. Ogre-esque men oozing class, compared to salon-styled primadonnas whose dialogue with officials is almost exclusively made of four-letter expletives.
The Rugby World Cup is just around the corner and in inadvertent condemnation of the beautiful game, referees will be keeping a particular eye out for ‘football style’ cheating at the tournament in England. That’s right, Premier League practices have reached extremis to the point a contact sport that has left players paralysed an even taken lives in the past now fears their game is being infiltrated by football’s foul conduct – particularly intimidation of officials, sensationalised appealing and simulation. Diving’s so unheard of in rugby they don’t even have specific rules for it – it simply falls under the parameter of ‘ungentlemanly conduct’.
Perhaps I have veered towards the realms of hyperbole but there’s much football can learn from its oblong cousin, particularly in regards to how referees treat players and managers and vice versa. In rugby they command respect. They’re almost the god – and crazy, merciless bloodthirsty Old Testament god that is – of the pitch; their word is final, indisputable and essentially gospel. Any dissent immediately results in a penalty. If a penalty is already awarded, it’s moved ten yards forward.
There are safeguards for football referees too. Yellow cards can be awarded for aggressive confrontation, surrounding the referee, attempting to influence decisions with persistent appealing, using foul language towards officials or any gestures – including shaking of the head and sarcastic clapping – that can be deemed derogatory.
How often this punishment is put to practice, however, continuously varies with referees and the importance of the game they’re involved in. Whilst few would hesitate to book an aggressive foul-mouth in a mid-table clash, those partaking in a Premier League title decider rarely receive the same level of indiscriminate justice.
The simple fact is that the spectators don’t want one moment of bookable immaturity ruining a game, whilst the referee in question will spend the next week sprawled across the backpages – with everybody from Howard Webb to Harry Redknapp giving their verdict – should one yellow card become two. All of a sudden we’re discussing how a single controversial booking could cost a club £50-oddmillion by the end of May – and it’s usually the referee rather than the player who is deemed the ultimate offender.
Reasons as to why are traced in the differences between the sports. As aforementioned, courtesy, respect and gentlemanly behaviour is ingrained in egg chasers from their first session of tag rugby as a toddler. On the other hand, a culture has developed in football, from the terraces to the touchline and even on the pitch itself, which deems influencing referees as acceptable gamesmanship.
There’s also less money and resultantly less pressure in rugby; unlike the increasingly corporate world of the beautiful game, honour tends to take precedent over fiscal reward. Similarly, viewership in the UK is much smaller. Six million Brits tuned in for the 2011 Rugby World Cup final; 21million tuned in for Germany’s showdown with Argentina in Brazil last summer.
Yet as much as some of these factors are out of their control and as much as players and coaches deserve their fair share of the blame, it’s still the duty of referees to assert objective authority in spite of pressure otherwise. While it may result in unwanted attention from the tabloids, hyperbolic scrutiny from managers and for a short period weekly chaos in the Premier League, unless football officials begin to command the respect of their rugby counterparts the status quo is unlikely to change.
Revolution is not only needed from the rule makers at FIFA, UEFA and the FA, but also those who need it most – the referees themselves.
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