The Ref Stop

Cardiff Ref Strike

The Ref Stop
Utter disgrace never ever will support a strike and if I’m ever close enough to a area striking I will go there and cover as many games as possible the mental and physical benefits of the hundreds if not thousands are of more concern to me.
It might be worth reading all of the posts and reactions to their X account (https://x.com/CardiffReferees) to understand this is an act of last resort and also what an outlier position you're adopting (which, I hasten to add, you're absolutely entitled to).
 
Utter disgrace never ever will support a strike and if I’m ever close enough to a area striking I will go there and cover as many games as possible the mental and physical benefits of the hundreds if not thousands are of more concern to me.
As opposed to supporting the mental health of your fellow referees who go out each week, and have been assaulted and abused as per the reason they are striking.. nice one.

They can still play, they just won't have qualified, neutral referee.
 
It was always going to happen and I do think this will be the catalyst to many other RA's striking around the UK. Unfortunately it seems like it will be the only way for it to actually make a difference.

My thoughts are with the referees who have been mentally and physically abused for this to happen.
 
This was always going to happen, and quite frankly I support them every step of the way. My youth league is currently struggling to cover games because of increased numbers of reports of abuse and assault, and it's unfortunately a large scale problem. The only way people will learn is if referees take action, so fair play to them.
 
Utter disgrace never ever will support a strike and if I’m ever close enough to a area striking I will go there and cover as many games as possible the mental and physical benefits of the hundreds if not thousands are of more concern to me.
Attitudes like this don't help the problem at all. They are striking because referees are being assaulted and abused left, right and center. It's a shame you aren't attempting to support them. No doubt if it happened to you you'd probably consider taking a week off. That is exactly the same.
 
Attitudes like this don't help the problem at all. They are striking because referees are being assaulted and abused left, right and center. It's a shame you aren't attempting to support them. No doubt if it happened to you you'd probably consider taking a week off. That is exactly the same.
Nope wouldn’t even consider it as I’m not a hypocrite and can never and will never support these actions that’s my view and will never change actions like this make me massively ashamed.
 
The only disgraceful thing about any of this is the behaviour towards match officials who now feel the need to strike. It is absolutely the right thing for them to be doing
They are a disgrace to the sport be nice if the CFA gave them a strong warning that this type of actions will not be tolerated as collective punishment is not something they can endorse.
 
Frankly I think that your entire mentality to the situation is unpleasant to say the least, we as referees are seemingly the only people who will support each other through our highs and lows. I hope that as a community we should be able to stand together on this and show the troublesome clubs that they aren't just ruining it for themselves but also to the good ones as you say.

It might also give the league a kick up the arse to actually punish any clubs or individuals who have created this issue.
 
Frankly I think that your entire mentality to the situation is unpleasant to say the least, we as referees are seemingly the only people who will support each other through our highs and lows. I hope that as a community we should be able to stand together on this and show the troublesome clubs that they aren't just ruining it for themselves but also to the good ones as you say.

It might also give the league a kick up the arse to actually punish any clubs or individuals who have created this issue.
Frankly I find collective punishment baffling and disgusting CFA should warn against then come down hard on referees participating I have a real issue with this maybe it’s the neurodivergence or maybe I’m just a better human than some I cannot fathom punishing innocents in any aspect of life and find those who do utterly reprehensible.
 
maybe I’m just a better human than some I cannot fathom punishing innocents in any aspect of life and find those who do utterly reprehensible.
I can only see that (in theory) yes it should only be the offenders who are punished, but in reality that is never the best way to get a message across. The best way for me to explain it is like at school where an entire class would be punished for 1 or 2 peoples actions, this made everyone have a go at those individuals.

Sometimes hooligans need to be treated like children to get the point across.
 
Depending on the demands of a strike, I would possibly behave as a scab
I'm about 400 games in now and can only recall maybe 4 games in which behaviour reached the threshold which would justify a personal notion of striking. However, I know many many others have had much worse experiences

The behavioural problem is caused by a small minority of despicable participants. In my experience, the FA don't deal with these folk effectively. I know of players with a very long disciplinary records who continually return from bans to behave exactly the same as they did before. This very small minority of participants need to be removed from the game completely

As many of you will know, my feeling is the relationship between referees and the football community is in tatters. The refereeing community are not blameless in terms of this being a two way street
 
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