A&H

Difference between Men's Sunday League and U18 League

L

lalec03

Loz
Yesterday I had two games, a Sunday league men's in the morning which I abandoned because I completely lost control of the game, insults coming from all over the place and a coach refusing to leave the premises after I'd shown him a red card. Players and coaches alike not happy with me, a few fouls that I may have got wrong purely because they were right in the corners and on the counter attack, another one where I was busy looking at the linesman behind me to see if the ball had gone out. Anyway, abandoned the game and went to my next fixture, a U18's game ending in a home team thrashing, three cautions all for bad tackles and generally a lot going on. Not many complaints from the players as such and both coaches were very co-operative. The club linesmen were also very helpful. At the end of the game, the home coach asks me if he can keep my number to have me as the referee in the future because he thought I was the best referee he had had for three years. I had a good game, but this was because of a few factors: the players wanted to play, they listened to explanations, the parents were nice, the linesmen were helpful, and the coaches were co-operative and well behaved. In the game I had in the morning, the situation was much the opposite.

I am noticing that every Sunday league game I referee, I have more yellow cards/sin bins with dissent and bad attitudes of players and coaches, and more trouble with players fabricating the outcome of a tackle and diving, than actual foul tackles and football related incidents. In these games I find the focus is much more on my performance as the referee than the game itself, but in the youth fixtures, it is not the case. My question is, am I to discredit my good performances in the youth games where there are bad tackles but players who actually want to play, with good linesmen and pleasant coaches? I think this is because it isn't necessarily a case of whether I can handle the stick that I get, because I have proven myself to do so before, but when the players failed to listen or empathise, I felt the need to abandon the game. I believe that being of a younger age also increases the match difficulty.

Thanks for reading, any advice would be greatly appreciated.
 
The Referee Store
Maybe stop refereeing Sunday League adults if that's the way you're treated or remember the team/teams and don't ref them
 
In my area, Sunday morning open age football is refereed by those coming through the ranks (who do the job properly and get dogs' abuse as a result) and by a bunch of guys who kindly turn up on Sunday mornings (but ignore OFFINABUS, seldom instigate disciplinary measures properly, and accept the abuse as the norm)
Players accept physicality within and outside the LOTG, and most teams have an enforcer or two to mete out revenge tackles when appropriate.
The "Sunday morning referees" (as opposed to the up and coming) accept all of that, and their yellow and red cards could be sold on eBay as "hardly used"
This makes it very difficult for any new referee in the league, keen to manage and control games, as standards continue to decline.
 
Ok, to quickly touch on the op's own points, f you feek you are missing fouls in the corners and/or on the breakaway, thats on the referee
Of course we will never see eveything and of course anybody can be caught out on the break, but, you maybe should have altered positioning to suit, and, on the break? run like the wind, then, faster.

by sounds of it, scrap the adults * for now* and concentrate on the more enjoyable. if we aint enjoying our hobby, there is no point

as typed by poster above a Sunday adult game needs different skills to a juvenile match, it can really be a case of just meeting the players expectations, rather than the expectations in the book....
 
ChasObserverRefDeveloper said:
In my area, Sunday morning open age football is refereed by those coming through the ranks (who do the job properly and get dogs' abuse as a result) and by a bunch of guys who kindly turn up on Sunday mornings (but ignore OFFINABUS, seldom instigate disciplinary measures properly, and accept the abuse as the norm)
Players accept physicality within and outside the LOTG, and most teams have an enforcer or two to mete out revenge tackles when appropriate.
The "Sunday morning referees" (as opposed to the up and coming) accept all of that, and their yellow and red cards could be sold on eBay as "hardly used"
This makes it very difficult for any new referee in the league, keen to manage and control games, as standards continue to decline.
Click to expand...
True but these referees are also the fabric of the Sunday League game. They will be their long after the younger refs have achieved their promotions and moved on. I really dislike the way older (usually) refs are treated i these leagues by some of the refereeing community. I've often heard refs slaggging off these refs who to be frank are no way near the quality they think they are and thays being polite.

So yes, there's refs don't do it as we would all like, but without them there week in/week out, year in/year out there is no Sunday league for anybody to referee on.
 
In my area, Sunday morning open age football is refereed by those coming through the ranks (who do the job properly and get dogs' abuse as a result) and by a bunch of guys who kindly turn up on Sunday mornings (but ignore OFFINABUS, seldom instigate disciplinary measures properly, and accept the abuse as the norm)
Players accept physicality within and outside the LOTG, and most teams have an enforcer or two to mete out revenge tackles when appropriate.
The "Sunday morning referees" (as opposed to the up and coming) accept all of that, and their yellow and red cards could be sold on eBay as "hardly used"
This makes it very difficult for any new referee in the league, keen to manage and control games, as standards continue to decline.
Ben448844 said:
True but these referees are also the fabric of the Sunday League game. They will be their long after the younger refs have achieved their promotions and moved on. I really dislike the way older (usually) refs are treated i these leagues by some of the refereeing community. I've often heard refs slaggging off these refs who to be frank are no way near the quality they think they are and thays being polite.

So yes, there's refs don't do it as we would all like, but without them there week in/week out, year in/year out there is no Sunday league for anybody to referee on.
Click to expand...
The point I was making is that because this group don't do the job properly, new colleagues coming into the league are met with totally different expectations by players and managers, and their club marks suffer when they do the job properly.
Having trained many hundreds of referees who turn out in mini soccer, youth football and open age leagues, I know they are important but they make life difficult for their colleagues.
 
ChasObserverRefDeveloper said:
In my area, Sunday morning open age football is refereed by those coming through the ranks (who do the job properly and get dogs' abuse as a result) and by a bunch of guys who kindly turn up on Sunday mornings (but ignore OFFINABUS, seldom instigate disciplinary measures properly, and accept the abuse as the norm)
Players accept physicality within and outside the LOTG, and most teams have an enforcer or two to mete out revenge tackles when appropriate.
The "Sunday morning referees" (as opposed to the up and coming) accept all of that, and their yellow and red cards could be sold on eBay as "hardly used"
This makes it very difficult for any new referee in the league, keen to manage and control games, as standards continue to decline.
The point I was making is that because this group don't do the job properly, new colleagues coming into the league are met with totally different expectations by players and managers, and their club marks suffer when they do the job properly.
Having trained many hundreds of referees who turn out in mini soccer, youth football and open age leagues, I know they are important but they make life difficult for their colleagues.
Click to expand...
Totally get that and accept it. But its the lesser of 2 evils. Like I said, without these refs there's no adult amateur football for the up and coming refs (who will go on to much better things as a result of said coaching).

My brother is a level 7 and never wants to be anything else. He won't ref the game as he probably should because he's doing it for some money to take his kids on holiday once or twice a year. He doesn't care about putting in performances which will get him up the ladder, he just wants to get through the game and go home. He covers 3-5 games a week in an area which is mad short on refs. If he was made to referee it like we expect he'd do something else and those games go uncovered along with the rest in that area. Just the way it is. Its not as important to them as it is to us
 
Sunday league can be difficult for new / young / inexperienced referees. The behaviour is generally much worse than equivalent Saturday games, and you have to be strong or they will stamp all over you, and the more weakness they sense the worse they will get. The best option if you are struggling might be to step away from it for a while to build up confidence.

Chas makes a very valid point, it can be really difficult for referees that want to do things properly if they are "next weeks' referee" following the guy who is just there for his money, lets everything go and "pleases" the teams in doing so. And often these referees think they are the bees' knees, but never test that out by going for promotion, don't keep up with law, and have no interest in furthering themselves as they already think they are the best. I've heard loads say that they could easily referee a Premier League game and do better than some of the SG1 officials, and I include a former prominent poster on this site in that, which I'm sure all of us know is utter claptrap. Some Sunday leagues really monitor their referees and make sure that they are doing their jobs properly, others really couldn't care less as long as they are getting games covered, and as Ben rightly says, those referees with no desire for promotion are needed.

To give a personal example, I really struggled with Sunday mornings when I was going 7 to 6, but I was fine on Saturday afternoons. When I quit L3 I went back to Sunday mornings and it was a breeze. Partly because I was a vastly better referee than I'd been 15+ years ago, partly because I was hugely more experienced at reading the game and what was going to happen, partly because a lot of players knew I'd been at a much higher level so just trusted me, and partly through luck. I went double figures of games without a single card, and I think my colleagues thought I was just ignoring it, but rather I was using my experience to be proactive, sensing potential danger, and be constantly talking to players. It helps being bald and older, as like it or not players will try it on with younger referees, but the key thing is if they trust you, if you have that trust they will generally leave you alone. Unfortunately, that trust isn't easy to get.
 
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