The Ref Stop

Accrington Disallowed Goal

Brian Hamilton said:
It's not the highlighting of the error that bothers me, it's the snide remarks such as
"Trevor Kettle....say no more."
"Always seems to find himself on the wrong end of a decision for some reason :confused:"
"...with Trevor Kettle, not a lot surprises me anymore"
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Unfortunately, Mr Kettle seems to be involved in a lot of 'controversial' incidents that centre around decisions he makes....late penalties being a speciality it seems.

Of course, he could just be incredibly unlucky, but some officials just seem to suffer more than others........why could that be?

Of course, it isn't helped that incidents such as yesterday's are entirely avoidable....
Finally, I'm afraid that with the rise in status and the associated publicity comes the inevitable critics.....if they can't handle that aspect of the position.......?
 
The Ref Stop
A small amount of devil's advocacy follows...

As the defending side, are you happy to let the referee add on the extra two seconds in the knowledge that it makes the difference between a draw and a defeat, because Law 18?

On a more practical level, if a referee applies a rule in a way that everyone agrees is "technically correct" but should never ever be done, is that not prima facie evidence that the rule should be changed? The method of ending play used by rugby union seems perfectly workable to me.
 
xPositor said:
For rugby union, it makes perfect sense. In football, with added time, which is ITOOTR, it wouldn't be workable.
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Sorry, should have been a bit clearer - it would still be the referee's job to add whatever time he sees fit, but once that point has been reached play does not end until the next time the ball goes dead, unless it's for a free kick or penalty.
 
quizeye said:
Sorry, should have been a bit clearer - it would still be the referee's job to add whatever time he sees fit, but once that point has been reached play does not end until the next time the ball goes dead, unless it's for a free kick or penalty.
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The difference with rugby is that when time is up, its up (and displayed as such) - and a team can choose to play the ball out to end the game. Unless timekeeping was taken out of the hands of the referee, I don't think the above is workable. The current system works fine, when - as others have said - a little bit of Law 18 is applied.
 
I've long thought football time-keeping should borrow one or two things from rugby: taking it off field and having someone else calculating time to be added on, for example. And I don't see much of a problem with playing on till it goes out of play - in fact, that may be pretty exciting.

The thing a situation like the one at Wimbledon highlights is that time added on is far from an exact science - totally at the referee's discretion; always a 'guesstimate' anyway - so it's never going to be a case of "an extra two seconds" - and in this case it was a millisecond - and there's always room to blow that little bit early, that little bit late. depending on what's going on on the field.
 
Just watched it several more times. You've got to give him something: he's created a moment of brilliant TV. It's addictive. It's mind-blowing. It's like coming home from work and seeing Mahut and Isner still going: something so extraordinarily unthinkable it totally boggles the brain.

I'd love to know exactly where the ball was when the first peep of the whistle blew. 3 yards out? 0.02 seconds from going in?

Trevor Kettle's my new hero. Can't wait to see what he comes up with next.
 
Brian Hamilton said:
I don't know Trevor Kettle but I'm not sure he'd like being called out on an internet forum by a group of officials who have yet to reach the level he has attained.

Also, I don't know about you but I think I made at least 4 mistakes in my game this morning. Fortunately, I didn't have any cameras there (apart from the Yorkshire Evening Post's football correspondent).
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I understand Brian's point, but in fairness to the posters, it does always seem to be Trevor. A personable chap by many accounts but seems to have run over more than his share of black cats on the way to games.

With that in mind, just temper the criticism please. Where it's justified - such as "shot himself in the foot again" - that's fair enough, but please avoid personal attacks. Nobody's done so yet thankfully, so let's leave that to fan forums ;)
 
It is a conundrum.

Was it fair to the attacking team that he blew his whistle when he did and subsequently disallow a cracking goal, probably not.

But, would it have been fair to the defending team if he'd added on a couple of seconds and them go 1 nil down, probably not.

He's between a rock and a hard place, though I think he'd have drawn less flack for allowing the goal.
 
frank_ref said:
I've long thought football time-keeping should borrow one or two things from rugby: taking it off field and having someone else calculating time to be added on, for example.
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I suppose another alternative could be the NFHS (US High Schools) system. They have an off-field timekeeper who stops the clock when signaled to do so by the referee. When time has expired the timekeeper gives a signal (often a buzzer). If a goal-bound ball does not cross the line before time expires, a goal is not scored.

I'm not sure that I particularly like that system - I'm just mentioning it since we're discussing alternatives.
 
It wouldn't take too much adjustment to the laws, in fact the laws of Futsal already has this provision. As long as the shot has been taken before the whistle, the period isn't over until the next touch or a goal is scored.
Perhaps Trevor should have spoken to the IAFB before their meeting last week with his suggestion.
I don't mind Trevor Kettle but he does seen to attract adverse publicity. Shame, really.
 
CO. DOWN REF said:
Imagine you're one of the assistants though - how do you get through that interval without saying something? No room for anyone because the elephant's too Big?
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A work colleague of mine actually was.
He wouldn't discuss the incident with me but his words were "I'll discuss what happened during a training event - it was a most unfortunate incident". :cool:
 
The problem is that stoppage time is, at best, a rough estimate.
The guidelines are fairly loose in the LOTG, and even when following those the clock is never stopped at the right second.
And of course, there's the laughably nonsensical notion that stoppage time apparently only occurs in round figures. Football takes a really, really bizarre approach to this sort of thing.
Ultimately though, that's why the idea of 'neutral territory' can be justified. Because not even the referee has any idea how much stoppage time there really was.

But if there are no subs, cards, injuries or noteworthy stoppages - why not blow it right on the halftime second?

I liked refereeing in an area with strict instructions for no stoppage time. I'd have no problems ending the game with the ball in midair towards an open goal - because it would be completely unfair not to.
 
personally i think as he was the allocated official in charge of all the final decisions that day, he was fully entitled to do whatever he wanted once the time had elapsed
 
Well, in any case, now that the season's done and dusted it's good to see that this disallowed goal didn't change anything...
 
frank_ref said:
Well, in any case, now that the season's done and dusted it's good to see that this disallowed goal didn't change anything...
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Yeah, it's not as if Accrington failed to go up on goal difference.

.... oh wait, yes they did ..!

Absolute crazy refereeing. The time indicated is the minimum, so no one really cares if you add an extra 2 or 3 seconds, which was all that was needed here. Wait until the ball is in a vaguely neutral area before blowing, if I was coaching an academy referee and they did what Trevor Kettle did I'd be going bananas, and for a vastly experienced Football League referee to do it is beyond belief.
 
What a fantastic decision, I would like to to buy this referee an extremely large drink!!

Lots of love, a very very very very smug happy Bristol Rovers fan!!!
 
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