I had a better second game yesterday, in a sense it was probably more of a baptism of fire as it was your typical Sunday League pre match organisation.
I turn up at the venue 40 minutes early, the goals were already set up and i was thinking so far, so good. Talk to the home team, get the match fee, all going smoothly then i see the opposition turn up, in exactly the same colours
I therefore run over to them whilst inspecting the pitch and tell them about the kit clash, to which they respond "oh yeah this happened last time we played but we just played on".... So they obviously didnt think to discuss this with each other for the re-match
The socks and shorts for both teams were black, and the home team had red and black shirts whilst the away was all red, but it wasn't ideal for sure.
As the kick off time is getting closer the home team only have 9 players turn up and no one on the sidelines to be a CAR. Not an ideal situation but the game ideally needs to go ahead, so i talk to both teams and tell them that in order to be fair there will be no CAR and i will be calling all the decisions. I mentioned to them as well that because they failed to get different kits they need to bear with me and in terms of offsides some decisions will be too tough to call, especially any scrambles in the box as socks, shorts and shirts are hard to differentiate. They were happy enough pre match and were on board with the decisions i made.
In terms of calling throw ins, corners and Goal kicks that went pretty well i felt, most of them were bread and butter decisions. There was one scramble i couldn't quite make out in the box so just went with the goal kick to stay on the safe side, a few moans but nothing too serious.
The biggest complaints were two goals. One the keeper rushed out to meet the ball but dropped it and never had full control as the ball was bouncing around, so the player nicked the ball and tapped it in. A few complaints but i think it was just the home team aggrieved that they conceded. The second goal they complained was offside, but this was in the last 10 minutes of the game, everyone in the box and as i mentioned pre match to them offsides will be tough to call due to the circumstances. Quite honestly it didn't look offside to me, and i couldn't see if it was so went with my instincts. A few players come over to complain but i just reminded them of our pre match discussion.
The one incident that i have been playing over and over in my head and not sure if i got right:
Ball was booted over the top, and keeper and attacker are both running for it, full intent. Either way whoever kicks it they are both going to clatter into one another. The attacker kicks the ball in the air but its not going goalwards, he hasn't genuinely beat the keeper (as i see it anyway) and they were both going in with full momentum so were not gettng out of eachothers way and then they collide. I therefore didn't give a free kick, there were a few grumbles and the covering defender kicked the loose ball out for a throw. If anything i felt it was a fair 50/50, maybe because the attacker technically got there first it was a free kick? I just felt a collision was going to happen whatever the case due to the way they were going in for the challenge.