The Referee Thread

[SB]

As with all of these things, he'll pocket a bundle of money and keep quiet. He'll have spent the last few weeks negotiating a settlement. Wholly unfairly

Only person who’ll benefit from this is his dealer

[Angryred]

How about ex-players, coaches, or managers? Would they not benefit from having played the game and give a different insight into refereeing?

[Kenneth]

The bias accusations would run amok though.

[Cerbie]

The bias accusations would run amok though.

Agreed. VAR officials need to be completely independent of the PGMOL. Refs should face a geographic ban and a supporting ban when officiating. If you are from or live within 50 miles of either club in a game, you can't play any part of it. PGMOL has a concentration of refs from the North West, but as far as I'm aware, there are no Refs with restrictions on officiating Manchester clubs - the potential bias conscious or otherwise is significant.

I'm totally unimpressed with them firing Coote too. They have told us nothing and being terminated with immediate effect does not mean there isn't a compromise agreement and that he has received a pay-off. They are brushing it all under the carpet and completely ignoring the spread betting allegations.

[Cerbie]

How about ex-players, coaches, or managers? Would they not benefit from having played the game and give a different insight into refereeing?

I'd prefer them to create an independent academy of pedantic geeks who have no interest in football to run VAR. PGMOL is effectively marking its own homework and the Old Boys club always closes ranks when there is a dubious call. It's a simple conflict of interest and has nothing to do with making the correct call.

Also the highlights of the Athletico v Sevilla game had the World Cup offside system immediately showing the call as a 3D cartoon, we don't even get the dodgy lines any more! What's that about??

[peterbread]

Would it be worth or possible to bring in overseas refs? No connection to any teams. You could try recruiting top refs like teams do with players. Don’t know if it would work but anything would be better than the current lot.

[Exiled_red]

Agreed. VAR officials need to be completely independent of the PGMOL. Refs should face a geographic ban and a supporting ban when officiating. If you are from or live within 50 miles of either club in a game, you can't play any part of it. PGMOL has a concentration of refs from the North West, but as far as I'm aware, there are no Refs with restrictions on officiating Manchester clubs - the potential bias conscious or otherwise is significant.

I'm totally unimpressed with them firing Coote too. They have told us nothing and being terminated with immediate effect does not mean there isn't a compromise agreement and that he has received a pay-off. They are brushing it all under the carpet and completely ignoring the spread betting allegations.

I came across this list of who referees support and which teams they aren't allowed to referee a while ago, originally it was somewhere else but I can now only seem to find it on the express website https://www.express.co.uk/sport/foot...-they-are-from (sorry about that)

It's interesting that there are a number of referees who aren't allowed to referee Liverpool and Everton games, now it makes sense for people from Merseyside of which there are a couple, but the same does not apply to refereeing Man City or Man Utd if they are from Greater Manchester.

Also Darren Bond from Wigan (Greater Manchester) who is a Wigan fan can't referee Liverpool or Everton games that's an interesting one. I grew up in Wigan and it's almost exactly equidistant from the centre of Manchester and Liverpool so exclusion of refereeing games involving teams from one City but not the other is interesting, especially when that City is Liverpool and the county he is from is Greater Manchester on geographic reasons if anything you would expect it to be Manchester he is excluded from refereeing teams from...

[baitman]

I came across this list of who referees support and which teams they aren't allowed to referee a while ago, originally it was somewhere else but I can now only seem to find it on the express website https://www.express.co.uk/sport/foot...-they-are-from (sorry about that)

It's interesting that there are a number of referees who aren't allowed to referee Liverpool and Everton games, now it makes sense for people from Merseyside of which there are a couple, but the same does not apply to refereeing Man City or Man Utd if they are from Greater Manchester.

Also Darren Bond from Wigan (Greater Manchester) who is a Wigan fan can't referee Liverpool or Everton games that's an interesting one. I grew up in Wigan and it's almost exactly equidistant from the centre of Manchester and Liverpool so exclusion of refereeing games involving teams from one City but not the other is interesting, especially when that City is Liverpool and the county he is from is Greater Manchester on geographic reasons if anything you would expect it to be Manchester he is excluded from refereeing teams from...

The criteria was probably drawn up with input from DBF

[Mark79]

How about ex-players, coaches, or managers? Would they not benefit from having played the game and give a different insight into refereeing?

When you hear them giving their opinions on big decisions as pundits, I’d probably have even less confidence in them than even the current referees!

[Cerbie]

When you hear them giving their opinions on big decisions as pundits, I’d probably have even less confidence in them than even the current referees!

[Cerbie]

The criteria was probably drawn up with input from DBF

Well he has been using Howard Webb as his puppet for decades so many a true word spoken in jest & all that!

[Cerbie]

I came across this list of who referees support and which teams they aren't allowed to referee a while ago, originally it was somewhere else but I can now only seem to find it on the express website https://www.express.co.uk/sport/foot...-they-are-from (sorry about that)

It's interesting that there are a number of referees who aren't allowed to referee Liverpool and Everton games, now it makes sense for people from Merseyside of which there are a couple, but the same does not apply to refereeing Man City or Man Utd if they are from Greater Manchester.

Also Darren Bond from Wigan (Greater Manchester) who is a Wigan fan can't referee Liverpool or Everton games that's an interesting one. I grew up in Wigan and it's almost exactly equidistant from the centre of Manchester and Liverpool so exclusion of refereeing games involving teams from one City but not the other is interesting, especially when that City is Liverpool and the county he is from is Greater Manchester on geographic reasons if anything you would expect it to be Manchester he is excluded from refereeing teams from...

Thanks for the list. Even the Expeess spot that Tierney is also from Wigan, but it seems claiming to support Wigan is enough to pass the red face test at PGMOL.

[Exiled_red]

When you hear them giving their opinions on big decisions as pundits, I’d probably have even less confidence in them than even the current referees!

[Angryred]

When you hear them giving their opinions on big decisions as pundits, I’d probably have even less confidence in them than even the current referees!

Haha, fair point! Cerbie makes a good point on independent facilitators to run VAR, can't be any worse than the current crowd running at the moment!!

[S-RED]

well that performance was interesting..... expected nothing from VAR as soon as i know Atwell was on the screens