The Ref Stop

Corruption

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ladbroke8745

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Last few months, if not longer, keep seeing posts on social media when decisions go against their teams, it's always corruption. Refs are corrupt. Don't want certain teams to win, or doing favours for other teams, being bought etc.
Not intentionally judging, but it mostly comes from Africans (judging by the profiles posting), but even a lot of Europeans, if not British, are saying corruption now.

For example, the incident in the Newcastle v Arsenal game - must be corruption as they don't want to upset Saudis, or don't want to see Arsenal win the league.
Or when Liverpool offside goal recently that shouldn't have been.
I'm not saying I agree. Just pointing out that when something happens, that they feel is incorrect, whether it is or not, it's classed as corruption and not just a mistake/error/incompetence.

Yet when Nunez put the ball into Watford yesterday instead of the goal when it was easier to score, that's not corruption, that's just "cr@p".
Or when Antonio shot wide from an open goal at the back post in the Brentford v West Ham game Saturday, when Benrahma had an even easier tap in (Antonio should've scored himself!), it was poor, and not corruption.

Why is it that if a referee makes a mistake, it's corruption, but a player, it's just poor?
 
The Ref Stop
Perhaps because there actual precedents from major European leagues for corruption - makes it easier to make baseless accusations.

Also football is now “designed” to create controversy from decisions by officials. The whole system is “rigged” against referees.

I think it’s gone so far that for many reasons (online abuse, baseless accusations, character slurs, death threats, even before we get to in-game abuse, and the disaster of in-game VAR)… it’s gone do far now - and the media/socials are far more about refereeing than than the football - it’s gone so far that the product (definitely in the UK) is damaged.

There’s no way I would pay a monthly sub to watch and, noting an increase in my own anxiety level, I think I might leave top flight football alone (especially if City go 6 points clear!).
 
The one that makes me chuckle is 'the referees in England just are not up to the standard they're needed to be - it's about time we get refs in from abroad'.

Firstly, how do they expect us to develop good referees in this country with that attitude?
Secondly, and far far far more importantly, do they not realise that in France everyone thinks French referees are crap, in Spain everyone thinks Spanish refs are crap, in Germany they all think German refs are crap...
 
To be honest, it's slanderous and libelous. It's about time people were held to account (i.e. prosecuted) for things they post online.

At risk of sounding like Donald Trump but the world is full of fake news. Mainstream & social media is full of deliberately sensationalist, inaccurate, and downright false reporting, allowed through their platforms.

Examples, with respect to refereeing just this week:

1) Anthony Taylor demoted
Not one of those articles mentioned that PGMOL have a requirement to cover so many EFL games and also forgot to mention that Darren England was also covering a game in the Championship.

Even if he was demoted it has not been confirmed from an official source, therefore reporting it as a fact, as it has been done, is out of order.

2) "the officials couldn't be sure the ball went out of play".
This is so misleading. What this fails to recognise is that there was 1 official who made a judgement the ball had not left the field of play. The VAR could not find a conclusive angle to show this was a clear and obvious error. Its quite subtle but ultimately they are two very different things.

and it's referees who are corrupt?
 
JamesL said:
To be honest, it's slanderous and libelous. It's about time people were held to account (i.e. prosecuted) for things they post online.

At risk of sounding like Donald Trump but the world is full of fake news. Mainstream & social media is full of deliberately sensationalist, inaccurate, and downright false reporting, allowed through their platforms.

Examples, with respect to refereeing just this week:

1) Anthony Taylor demoted
Not one of those articles mentioned that PGMOL have a requirement to cover so many EFL games and also forgot to mention that Darren England was also covering a game in the Championship.

Even if he was demoted it has not been confirmed from an official source, therefore reporting it as a fact, as it has been done, is out of order.

2) "the officials couldn't be sure the ball went out of play".
This is so misleading. What this fails to recognise is that there was 1 official who made a judgement the ball had not left the field of play. The VAR could not find a conclusive angle to show this was a clear and obvious error. Its quite subtle but ultimately they are two very different things.

and it's referees who are corrupt?
Click to expand...

I got in many a Facebook argument about the Anthony Taylor one... articles were all made to imply that, not only had he been 'demoted' but that it was a permanent thing that he would be operating on the Championship instead of the Premier league!
 
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Calciopoli - The idea that there couldn't possibly be any corruption within refereeing is provably false. And even the above aside, referees are deliberately kept away from teams they support and direct rivals of those, so there's even an acceptance within PGMOL of unconscious bias being a thing. So I do think as a community, referees need to be a little careful about immediately climbing onto their high horses at the first suggestion of corruption! It exists and we're more likely to catch it if we accept that and actively look out for it than if we try and pretend it could never possibly happen.

It's also a little bit of a logical fallacy to claim that players aren't called corrupt - two PL clubs are currently paying players who aren't allowed to be involved in matches due to possible corruption around betting on football. Where it exists, it is scrutinised - so it's not unreasonable to ask that if someone is going through Toney's accounts to find that corruption, are referees subject to the same safeguards?

And finally, I do think the PL has shot itself in the foot by allowing the whole issue of a country effectively owning a club and then allowing referees to go to that country to referee. I don't obviously think the referees are coming home with suitcases of cash, but it does seem inconsistent that for example, Michael Oliver isn't allowed to referee Newcastle, but is allowed to be sent on a first class work trip by the owners of various clubs that he can still referee. It's just daft for the PL to allow that, because it opens up obvious questions that could be easily avoided.

So yeah, "corruption" is overused. But refereeing could be smarter about getting rid of the appearance of possible corruption too - from more clarity around the issues I mentioned above, to releasing more audio (yes it's getting better, but there are still a number of "wrong" decisions that haven't received the Webb and Owen treatment), to just simply avoiding more weird decisions. I don't agree with the corruption claims, but it's daft to pretend we don't see why the question comes up.
 
RefereeX said:
The one that makes me chuckle is 'the referees in England just are not up to the standard they're needed to be - it's about time we get refs in from abroad'.

Firstly, how do they expect us to develop good referees in this country with that attitude?
Secondly, and far far far more importantly, do they not realise that in France everyone thinks French referees are crap, in Spain everyone thinks Spanish refs are crap, in Germany they all think German refs are crap...
Click to expand...
Fully agree with pretty much everything you put here, and its something I commented on YouTube (I think)

There is of course a possibility that there is corruption somewhere, but it seems rather unlikely.

Every single club could state multiple cases in which refereeing/VAR decisions haven't gone their way. What they fail to remember is all of the decisions that have gone their way.

Football is not a particularly honest sport. Anyone will do anything they can (dive, feign injury, time waste) to gain an advantage. Unfortunately it is generally deemed to be the referees fault when someone has deceived them, as opposed to the player in question
 
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RefereeX said:
Firstly, how do they expect us to develop good referees in this country with that attitude?
Click to expand...

You think that competition is going to hinder the ability of good referees to become better and rise to the top? I, personally, would love to see officials get moved around and for the top competitions to "poach" the top officials, for lack of a better word. There are extraordinary officials languishing in the Slovenian league who could make it in any one of the top 5 leagues in Europe. But they don't get to perform there because they weren't born there.
 
Runner-Ref said:
Fully agree with pretty much everything you put here, and its something I commented on YouTube (I think)

There is of course a possibility that there is corruption somewhere, but it seems rather unlikely.

Every single club could state multiple cases in which refereeing/VAR decisions haven't gone their way. What they fail to remember is all of the decisions that have gone their way.

Football is not a particularly honest sport. Anyone will do anything they can (dive, feign injury, time waste) to gain an advantage. Unfortunately it is generally deemed to be the referees fault when someone has deceived them, as opposed to the player in question
Click to expand...

It made me chuckle on Saturday, I was on the (senior) line for a step 3 game and the first time the away manager spoke to me it was to say 'I don't know how that was ours, but I'll take it' (about a throw in decision on the other side of the pitch). I smiled and said remember that when you get the one that goes against you later and he winked at me and said 'I won't'
 
RyantheRef said:
You think that competition is going to hinder the ability of good referees to become better and rise to the top? I, personally, would love to see officials get moved around and for the top competitions to "poach" the top officials, for lack of a better word. There are extraordinary officials languishing in the Slovenian league who could make it in any one of the top 5 leagues in Europe. But they don't get to perform there because they weren't born there.
Click to expand...

Of course competition could help, I was more referring to the dismissal of any English officials as any good and replacing them all with foreign officials.

My main point, though, was about the fact that these idiots seem to think that 'officiating standards' is only a problem in England and the rest of the world have fantastic referees. In reality, we have some very very good referees in this country already. It's the lack of understanding of spectators that is the problem, and that's the same all over the world.
 
I don't think a referee exchange programme would necessarily be the end of the world, but it would solve nothing.

Whilst we maybe have some referees that aren't up to it, we also have some very very good referees. A big part of the problem is the guidance/interpretations they are needing to follow when in England. The likes of Taylor, Oliver & Pawson are constantly out on European duties, yet we hardly ever hear of contentious decisions in those games. They referee differently when on European duty, so is this because that style of refereeing is better or is it because we maybe aren't as open to what controversies may happen in those games?
 
I think people also often forget that the generally excellent refereeing performances they see in the CL aren't being done by the 15th-best French referee - only the top few from each country get to do those games, so the standard will obviously be higher than random PL bottom-10 game refereed by someone who's being given a shot in SG1 for the first season.
 
RefereeX said:
Secondly, and far far far more importantly, do they not realise that in France everyone thinks French referees are crap, in Spain everyone thinks Spanish refs are crap, in Germany they all think German refs are crap...
Click to expand...
and even in the sometimes holier than thou world of rugby, apparently their best on-field and TMO officials are either crap, corrupt or both !
 
JamesL said:
To be honest, it's slanderous and libelous. It's about time people were held to account (i.e. prosecuted) for things they post online.

At risk of sounding like Donald Trump but the world is full of fake news. Mainstream & social media is full of deliberately sensationalist, inaccurate, and downright false reporting, allowed through their platforms.

Examples, with respect to refereeing just this week:

1) Anthony Taylor demoted
Not one of those articles mentioned that PGMOL have a requirement to cover so many EFL games and also forgot to mention that Darren England was also covering a game in the Championship.

Even if he was demoted it has not been confirmed from an official source, therefore reporting it as a fact, as it has been done, is out of order.

2) "the officials couldn't be sure the ball went out of play".
This is so misleading. What this fails to recognise is that there was 1 official who made a judgement the ball had not left the field of play. The VAR could not find a conclusive angle to show this was a clear and obvious error. Its quite subtle but ultimately they are two very different things.

and it's referees who are corrupt?
Click to expand...
This is why the other thread about proper employment regulations/cover/law. If there was proper representation, surely the media outlets would be forced to get the slander under control as a by product.

What would happen if Talksh*** callers started saying Nunez threw the game by missing the sitter, or ETH is obviously gaming the stock market price by starting Antony? The media outlets wouldn’t allow that because the players and coaches are protected.
 
GraemeS said:
I think people also often forget that the generally excellent refereeing performances they see in the CL aren't being done by the 15th-best French referee - only the top few from each country get to do those games, so the standard will obviously be higher than random PL bottom-10 game refereed by someone who's being given a shot in SG1 for the first season.
Click to expand...
This is my point. The Premier League is the best competition so why not let the best referees officiate those matches? Marciniak is wasted on Ekstraklasa matches.
 
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