A&H

Northumberland Football League - statement about continuing misconduct

lincs22

lincs22

Supply League Observer
Staff member
Observer/Tutor
One of the largest youth leagues in the country has today put the following statement out to all member clubs.
"The behaviour and conduct of far too many players, managers, coaches, and spectators is the worst we have ever seen in the history of the Northumberland Football League.

The discipline reports coming in over the first 10 weeks of the season, just to Northumberland Football Leagues, have given us and the County FA an incredible amount of work, on top of everything else we do to keep you playing football.

I am not going to lecture adults on how they should behave, it's not my job to teach you the difference between right and wrong, but what I will say is THIS BEHAVIOUR STOPS, AND IT STOPS NOW!

Starting from Saturday 18th November, any team found guilty of any discipline, welfare or misconduct charge WILL BE REMOVED FROM FIXTURES. If those fixtures include cup/competition games, then you will forfeit your place in those competitions.

Teams playing at central venues where parents are found to be acting in an unsuitable manner, verbally or physically abusing/ shouting at a referee, steward, league official, venue staff or opposition coaches/managers, the club in question will have EVERY PARENT/GUARDIAN/SPECTATOR from every team banned from every central venue.

This is children’s football - there is no place for abuse of any type - if you cannot watch a group of children playing football without feeling the need to abuse/shout at a child be they a player or a referee, or you cannot spend an hour and a half without swearing at the opposition coach or confronting a group of parents - then please ask yourself if you have chosen the correct way to spend your weekends.

We are a Respect League and Respect towards players, the officials and each other is the minimum standard which we will accept - NO RESPECT = NO GAME."

For and on behalf of the league management committee,
Lee Scott
League Secretary #EnoughIsEnough
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Will this make any difference, given the other warnings coming out of County FA's.

Kid's football no longer looks like fun, just a place for idiots to come and have a argument on a Sunday morning.

If this doesn't stop now, there won't be any clubs not associated with larger clubs.
 
The Referee Store
That is a really impressive line in the sand. I genuinely hope they hold firm on it because that is the only way after a statement like that. The need to be bold and they need to be consistent.

For a statement like that, there must have been some real nightmares.
 
Heard it all before though, sadly
Will have a degree of impact in the short term, but the cycle will do what cycles do and that League, like all other Leagues, will go back to square one after some amount of time
The more local an initiative is (even if it's on a National Level), the more doomed it is to failure
 
I am afraid that this is "last shot" from the committee in trying to control misconduct. I bet the majority of grassroots league committee are run by people well over 60, and they are getting issues they don't / can't deal with. These people will be resigning, but who to replace them with????

Younger people are going - "no, too much hassle" or "too busy to deal with". So either leagues fold, or they are going have to be taking over by employees of the CFA's. It will become a proper part-time job for some people on the CFA's payroll, so will want paying accordingly. So, league getting by on the goodwill of others, will require clubs to pay out to the FA's increased entry fees, along with registration fees, etc

Take a league with 5 age groups, 2 division on most groups (10 clubs per division), so call it 100 clubs. Fees for the CFA to manage the league will be at least £5K, so another £50 per age team. And the parents are going to moan about that.
 
lincs22 said:
I am afraid that this is "last shot" from the committee in trying to control misconduct. I bet the majority of grassroots league committee are run by people well over 60, and they are getting issues they don't / can't deal with. These people will be resigning, but who to replace them with????

Younger people are going - "no, too much hassle" or "too busy to deal with". So either leagues fold, or they are going have to be taking over by employees of the CFA's. It will become a proper part-time job for some people on the CFA's payroll, so will want paying accordingly. So, league getting by on the goodwill of others, will require clubs to pay out to the FA's increased entry fees, along with registration fees, etc

Take a league with 5 age groups, 2 division on most groups (10 clubs per division), so call it 100 clubs. Fees for the CFA to manage the league will be at least £5K, so another £50 per age team. And the parents are going to moan about that.
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Yeh, I mean my two local Youth Leagues have in excess of 250 games each per Sunday morning. Talking 500 games in within approx. 12 mile radius
I don't know what the answer is, except that it has to be across the board and it has to come from the very top. Which is why we're stuck permanently with the way things are... and yes, arguably getting worse
 
My local Sunday League has recently done similar (not cancelling games, but refusing to appoint refs), so it's definitely a trend that's catching on.

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A league near me had an ongoing problem with parents being abusive. They adopted a zero tolerance policy and enforced it. They didn’t leave it the reds, but had board members go to games. No warnings were given--first inappropriate yelling and the parent was told to leave. It took them a hear, but they completely changed the culture of the league. (I’m sure they lost people in the process.)

Ar about the time I started reffing in the U16/U19 division of our local AYSO Area, the commissioner came to the referee meeting and told the refs she was tired of hearing complaints about coaches without the refs taking action. She told the refs she wanted coaches and parents tossed if they weren’t behaving, and the Area would back the refs. The refs listened, and the Area backed them up. A couple of seasons later, we had hardly any send offs any more, as the culture and expectations were set and people knew what was accepted and not.

imhate the hand wringing about an insurmountable problem. It’s not insurmountable. It takes a decision and the willingness to go through the pain—all the way through the pain. To make it happen. Too many places (and I include many pro leagues in this) go half way. They make an announcement, follow through for a few weeks, then get lazy or chicken out because they caan’t handle the pain needed to get through to the other side. The PL could be a beacon and set the standard that would trickle down. It just doesn’t have the courage to accept the pain needed to get there.
 
lincs22 said:
If this doesn't stop now, there won't be any clubs not associated with larger clubs.
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One of the worst offending clubs at youth level in one our local leagues are part of a National League setup.
 
socal lurker said:
The PL could be a beacon and set the standard that would trickle down. It just doesn’t have the courage to accept the pain needed to get there.
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For any real change it has to be top-down, but it won't be because it makes for good TV.
 
This all comes right back to what we have been discussing in other threads, that peoples opinions/actions towards referees is getting worse & worse. This is the same in the pro-game (just look at pundits & coaches constantly speaking waffle) and grassroots. Unfortunately, grassroots learn their behaviours from what they see happening on TV. Comments like De Zerbi's recent comments are a prime example of this.

But we have been here before. League/County FA make a threat and maybe follow through on it for a week or 2. Then we go back to normal.

When I was on a league committee a few years ago, we had 2/3 clubs who we constantly had issues with due to their conduct. I wanted to put them to the bottom of the barrel when it came to referee appointments (we were struggling to cover all games at the time, so I wanted all other games covered before those teams got a referee- and I didn't want this as a one off, I wanted it for the foreseeable until they learnt their lesson). The rest of the committee didn't want to go ahead with the idea as they felt it was unfair on the opposition teams potentially missing a week, as well as it causing a fixture backlog.

If a threat is made, it needs following through on for an extended period.
 
Runner-Ref said:
This all comes right back to what we have been discussing in other threads, that peoples opinions/actions towards referees is getting worse & worse. This is the same in the pro-game (just look at pundits & coaches constantly speaking waffle) and grassroots. Unfortunately, grassroots learn their behaviours from what they see happening on TV. Comments like De Zerbi's recent comments are a prime example of this.

But we have been here before. League/County FA make a threat and maybe follow through on it for a week or 2. Then we go back to normal.

When I was on a league committee a few years ago, we had 2/3 clubs who we constantly had issues with due to their conduct. I wanted to put them to the bottom of the barrel when it came to referee appointments (we were struggling to cover all games at the time, so I wanted all other games covered before those teams got a referee- and I didn't want this as a one off, I wanted it for the foreseeable until they learnt their lesson). The rest of the committee didn't want to go ahead with the idea as they felt it was unfair on the opposition teams potentially missing a week, as well as it causing a fixture backlog.

If a threat is made, it needs following through on for an extended period.
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My local Sunday League does the opposite. Worst behaved sides get a small pool of refs that can handle them, quite often with neutral ARs
 
Runner-Ref said:
Which makes no sense, as they're basically being rewarded for their poor behaviour
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It sounds practical but it does nothing to challenge poor behaviour. I suppose it depends what the league prioritises. I can see the logic behind it and I can see why neutral ARs would help control a game, but I can imagine nobody ever gets questioned about the way they act.
 
Big Cat said:
I know... but it does work because the games generally get completed without serious incident
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If you asked most clubs, they'd love to have NAR's in their games. Just seems very unfair that the worst behaved clubs must have them to stand a chance of their games passing without incident. Whereas the better behaved clubs don't get them.
 
We've had two assaults, one hospitalising a player today in our league. (Don't blame me, I was off for some martial arts stuff - much safer!)
I'm not sure what the league response will be, but as the chairman is also a referee I imagine it will be big. I wonder if something like certain games having three officials, which the problem teams have to pay for, could solve the issue?
 
The crap attitude teams thrive without a ref. They walk over other teams as they have zero sportsmanship.

I've had managers say this to me and I've read other people mention this on the forum.
 
JBeil said:
wonder if something like certain games having three officials, which the problem teams have to pay for, could solve the issue?
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That's not solving the issue. That's simply the stucking plaster. Solving the issue is getting shot of the problem teams.
 
JBeil said:
We've had two assaults, one hospitalising a player today in our league. (Don't blame me, I was off for some martial arts stuff - much safer!)
I'm not sure what the league response will be, but as the chairman is also a referee I imagine it will be big. I wonder if something like certain games having three officials, which the problem teams have to pay for, could solve the issue?
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Was it the referee who assaulted the player? 🤔😁 Just checking!
 
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