A&H

No Contact, No Confirmation, No Respect!

Silhouette

Silhouette

Target of Abuse
Level 7 Referee
Ill put this one in New Ref Jazz, because this is the first time its happened.

I usually get my fixtures from a spreadsheet from one of two people, FullTime system – or an email from my other league organiser.

If it’s a cup match, it’s the usual one dude who organises cup games.

This Saturday, I get a phone call at 130pm (whilst I'm sat at my Aunties having Christmas Lunch) from a club secretary asking me “Where am I?”

After a bit of a long conversation, this club has emailed me directly – telling me I'm their ref for a cup I haven’t heard of.

I check my emails – and yes *in SPAM* I find an email from this lady telling me about the match and to confirm my attendance.

I obviously didn’t get this email – and so therefore, didn’t reply with a confirmation.

The club also didn’t phone me to confirm, which I've had with 100% of my games, league, cup or whatever.

So, because I'm the other side of the county – I tell them that ill help them out (part of their rage, is that this is a super important semi final cup game), but I wont be there for at least 30-40 minutes.

They agree and I begin a super hurried rush around my county to get home, get changed and get to the other side of town.

Then, throughout the whole game I'm getting hammered with crap about being late, sitting at home on the couch and over sleeping (and every other bit of stick about being late).

I explain to the captains that this level of nonsense that I was getting needs to stop – and that my late appearance was no fault of my own.

They agree.

Abuse continues.

If I had started giving cautions… Its not really dissent… Because they’re not questioning my decisions…

They’ll just essentially… giving me sh!t.

What could I have done?

PS Should I have put through a misconduct/form thing for the club not confirming and not ringing me?

If you send and email and say “Please confirm” and they don’t – surely you must expect the referee *NOT* to turn up
 
The Referee Store
You need to report to the appropriate senior authority of the cup competition (was it County, League, other etc)

In terms of dissent, yes you can (and probably should have) caution for that kind of stuff. They're questioning YOU, so do them for it. Not your fault, so why should you be made to feel like it is?
 
I agree with Dan.

That said, I wouldn't be leaving my Christmas dinner... :D
 
Dissent any day if the week. Especially after you have had a word with the captains. Not misconduct however, but I would report it to the competition organiser though. If it were a league game out my way the team would be looking at a breach of league rules fine.
 
A couple of cautions for dissent early doors would have quelled that I'm sure.

I feel compelled to ask the question currently on every bodies lips though...

Christmas lunch on Saturday?? Did your Auntie get the timings wrong on the turkey?? :p:D
 
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Just to add BTW, if I was in this situation, I'd be turning the game down on the phone as it's THEIR fault I've not had confirmation and I now have plans. I'd immediately phone the appropriate ref sec and inform them of the news and information.
 
When i was officiating in the Berks & Bucks league i received a letter with 4 weeks of matches,and the home team manager had to ring me by the Wednesday night to confirm the match(if not i had to report him on the match card) ground fit,and confirm no colour clashes.I don't get that pleasure of home manager confirmation now with Lancashire.
 
DanCohen17 said:
Silhou, out of interest, what (if anything) did you report to the appropriate secretaries?
Click to expand...

Not a sausage.

There was a little bit of attitude on the phone about "Well, 30 peoples days are going to be ruined" and "This is the semi final of the cup!" etc etc. So I was properly guilt'ed into it.

I have a lot of Aunties and Aunties-In-Law, so this was when we'd scheduled to see Auntie #7 sort of thing - so she put on a bit of a Christmas 'ting.

Didnt go to well that I literally had to down tools and drive around my county.

Yes. Now I look back, I should have said

"Did anyone give you the confirmation you requested? Did anyone phone at any point before the fixture to confirm?"
 
Also, because id never heard of this cup - I didnt have any contact details for anyone 'up' the ladder.

All my cup fixtures come from one dude (Tony Major) and so im not surprised this one went straight into junk/spam.

I recognised one of the teams too, so they must be a league I officiate somewhere else...
 
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