The Ref Stop

Junior/Youth Match Anbandoned - it's a farce!

J

Jack M

Active Member
Level 6 Referee
U18 match on Sunday. Whites v Reds. Pitch was borderline playable following an adult match. I decided to give the match a chance. 4-1 to Whites at HT. I go over to one of the penalty boxes and have a look as it has got a bit more cut up and I brought the managers and captains in as well as a ball. We tried to pass the ball over the aformentioned area and the ball was stopping before reaching the opponent. It also stuck tonthe floor when dropped on the pitch.
I said to the managers that as it stands this area is unplayable. The home managers went and got some pitchforks from the groundsman and proceeded to fork the pitch. This didn't improve the pitch at all and I said my decision is to abandon the game. Home assistant manager said that 90% of the pitch was ok and that we should take the risk. Moron. Went to my bag to collect my stuff and parents were saying that it was farcical of me to abandon and that I took too long to decide. (I took 20 mins after blowing for HT as I was giving them a chance to make the pitch playable).
 
The Ref Stop
Don't start a game of you don't think you will finish it. (See the latest refereeworld podcast).

your mistake was giving it a chance.

Been here, done this. Also had a team winning easily when I abandoned (they lost the replayed match which they never let me forget). Nobody wins, lots of bad feeling.

Live and learn mate.
 
I thought it was possible that the match would finish.The pitch just deteriorated quicker than I thought
 
It's not a great option - but - with hindsight - if the pitch is obviously going to deteriorate - you could have played 35 min each way from the start

I'm awful at this - I probably might have given it a go and then just carried on to finish the game - with everything crossed nothing bad happens (which I could have easily avoided pre-ko) ... not the way to do it
 
Have to say, I find muddy pitches the hardest to call. If it's frozen or there's standing water then decision is clear. But if it's muddy and you know that during the course of the game it will cut up further then judging the right course of action is hard. Like Alex71. my instinct is to give it a go.

Had one recently in a County Cup game where all involved wanted to play. Home team as they were used to the pitch like that. Away team as they'd travelled 45 mins to get there and me because I'm an optimistic sort! End result. We got the game played, end to end thriller and tired legs all round. Game wasn't pretty, especially in the second half but we got there. Only question for me when it comes to mud is how to decide at what point it becomes farcical / dangerous?
 
Russell Jones said:
Have to say, I find muddy pitches the hardest to call. If it's frozen or there's standing water then decision is clear. But if it's muddy and you know that during the course of the game it will cut up further then judging the right course of action is hard. Like Alex71. my instinct is to give it a go.

Had one recently in a County Cup game where all involved wanted to play. Home team as they were used to the pitch like that. Away team as they'd travelled 45 mins to get there and me because I'm an optimistic sort! End result. We got the game played, end to end thriller and tired legs all round. Game wasn't pretty, especially in the second half but we got there. Only question for me when it comes to mud is how to decide at what point it becomes farcical / dangerous?
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When you have to penalise for a challenge that was obviously mistimed because the ball got stuck in the mud. You're probably one robust challenge away from a caution/dismissal/broken leg
 
No one think it's fun to play in the mud? I quite like it myself. Good comedy. And it's better than sittin' at home doin' nowt.

Still, some video evidence of mud being dangerous'll go a ways to changing my mind.
 
Brian Hamilton said:
When you have to penalise for a challenge that was obviously mistimed because the ball got stuck in the mud
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If the ball's not properly rolling on the pitch, whether because of standing water or mud, then I'll call it a day. It's more those situations where the mud is somewhat impacting on players' ability to change direction / make good connection with the ball that I struggle to know how to deal with ..
 
Russell Jones said:
Have to say, I find muddy pitches the hardest to call. If it's frozen or there's standing water then decision is clear. But if it's muddy and you know that during the course of the game it will cut up further then judging the right course of action is hard. Like Alex71. my instinct is to give it a go.

Had one recently in a County Cup game where all involved wanted to play. Home team as they were used to the pitch like that. Away team as they'd travelled 45 mins to get there and me because I'm an optimistic sort! End result. We got the game played, end to end thriller and tired legs all round. Game wasn't pretty, especially in the second half but we got there. Only question for me when it comes to mud is how to decide at what point it becomes farcical / dangerous?
Click to expand...

Agree - learnt that lesson very early in my refereeing career. I had a double header on adjacent pitches - 1st match was OK, but I really shouldn't have started the 2nd one and once I did and realised that game was a farce, should have abandoned it, but didn't.

One very angry parent afterwards who was going to "report" me - of course he didn't - but he was right all the same!:oops:

Much more decisive now about postponements, 13 years later!
 
Your opening statement says everything.

Jack M said:
.... Pitch was borderline playable following an adult match. I decided to give the match a chance....
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If borderline at the start it cannot improve, especially if adult or U18 football. On muddy pitches, always think the worst.
 
To be fair, I have yet to abandon a match due to anything (usually they get called off before I go but only by a few hours!). I personally consider myself very lucky that I haven't needed to abandon or even postpone a match in my short career thus far... (and now watch as in the next year I'll do it at least once :D).
 
I had above thing happen to me I played 67 out possible 80 and I'd already lined on it from the morning and pitch was great but we had rain in the afternoon and it cut up over course of the 67 mins I played it took one bad tackle for me to call it
 
I had one last year where it got to Kick off time and it was hammering down with rain but the pitch was playable at this point. 20 minutes in with the score at 1-0 to the home side the pitch was getting in a bad way and when the ball went out of play I mentioned to the 2 managers that I was thinking about calling it a day. On 35 minutes the away team leveled and this seemed a good point to abandon the game!:D Both teams and managers agreed. Not sure what it would've been like if it was 3-0 to one team though!?
 
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