OFFINABUS & Match Conditions

[Macca]

Recent match of mine - red player calls out, not too loudly "you fat c**t" to a blue player that is quite a distance away. Player didn't hear, but his team mates did.
To this point, there was plenty of needle in the game and the blue sideline has been constantly calling for everything and anything with the coach the classic example of passive aggressive. When I warn him on his criticism of my decisions, his response is he is not talking to me but his fellow coach and he is entitled to speak to his fellow coach. I warn him that once I hear him critical of my decisions it is dissent and to knock it off.
The rest of the blue sideline is also very mouthy.

So, when red player makes the comment, I call over red and as I am taking details ask him why it should not be a red card. I have already decided to give a yellow and tell the player I would often give a red for that comment but I am giving a yellow due to the behaviour of the blue sideline and in particular the coach. My rationale is their behaviour is contributing to the heat of the game and affecting the players.

Would you issue a red for the comment regardless of the match conditions and heat?

 

[davlon]

I think managing the bench more, prior to the serious offence, may have stopped the serious offence happening to begin with. Maybe getting the cards out for the coaches for dissent rather than just a warning (you said it was constant, probably easy enough to sell) may have encouraged them to hold their tongue.

Either way, if you think it was OFFINABUS then it was OFFINABUS, regardless of the heat of the game. Would you downgrade a excessive force challenge to reckless due to the heat of the game?

 

[one]

Either send off for it or no card if you think it's not deserved. Let it fly to next stoppage and then at next stoppage have a advisory chat with him. Personally I would send off, but I would also give cards for the oppo for their behaviour as you described (which prob means it won't get to the comments form red player you heard)

I don't agree with the approach of lowering one team's punishment because of bad behaviour of opposition. It often leads to loss of control.

 

[RobOda]

Would you issue a red for the comment regardless of the match conditions and heat?

Yes.

That doesn't sound like a match where you should have downgraded it to a yellow. And it looks like you missed a yellow or two already for dissent. You're only making it harder for yourself and for next week's referee.

Deal with the dissent/abuse please.

There may be times you can get away with ignoring an 'offence', but this isn't one of them IMO.

 

[Anubis]

I cant picture the scene, in short, was someone cautioned for calling an opponent a fat c word?

To clarify, what is the caution for here?

 

[Macca]

To clarify - the coach was loud calling for decisions but it never rose to dissent (and I have a very low bar). First time is always a warning, second is auto-yellow. Just prior to the comment, the coach shouted a couple of things at opposition players - nothing actionable though.
I am sure I didn't miss an opportunity to issue a yellow earlier.

I decided to go with yellow for USB. My thought process at the time was it would be incredibly harsh to send off for how it was said considering the tone of the match - players on both sides and one sideline who was needling the players through verbal nonsense. Also the player it was directed at was some distance away who never heard it - only the opposition players close by heard.

In hindsight, I do think I was wrong and I should have issued a red, hence coming here for opinions, but many a poster here allow more (as it is put) industrial language, where they use the c word in everyday use, so wonder if others allow people to use the c word when referring to opposition players.

 

[QuaverRef]

Love when players say ‘I was talking to my teammates, ref’ when being openly critical about your decisions like they’ve been clever enough to find some loophole

 

[one]

o clarify - the coach was loud calling for decisions but it never rose to dissent

Dissent is not always a case of one comment that is clearly dissent. Sometimes a few comments over time put together make it dissent. Many players and coaches are smart enough not to cross that line but get very close to it on each occasion. For yours, you have to be there, i am just reading off the description you gave.

many a poster here allow more (as it is put) industrial language,

Context is very important. Again my opinion was based on the context you provided. On another context, for example same words used, even very loud, in frustration, when a player skies a shot on goal I would likely only have a quite word on the run.

 

[GraemeS]

Agree with @one here - the development point to take from this incident is to have a greater sensitivity to the effect of constant low-level dissent. If you've already given him the warning, your bar perhaps needs to be even lower, I certainly wouldn't be accepting "the coach shouted a couple of things at opposition players" from someone I've already taken time out of the game to speak to.

Or, conversely, if you still think you're 100% correct on that, then we can presumably assume the opponent throwing a c-bomb at an opponent was functionally unprovoked and out of nowhere? In which case, why give him the leeway?

I don't quite see a consistent worldview here. From the way I read it, he was either provoked by a mouthy opposing team, in which case, I can sympathise with only going yellow but think you need to look at why you hadn't shut down the provocation and learn from that going forward. Or it was unprovoked (or at the very least, unnecessarily and massively escalating very low-level tensions) in which case I think you probably know you should have gone with the red and set a hard line for what's unacceptable.

 

[RyantheRef]

Recent match of mine - red player calls out, not too loudly "you fat c**t" to a blue player that is quite a distance away. Player didn't hear, but his team mates did.
To this point, there was plenty of needle in the game and the blue sideline has been constantly calling for everything and anything with the coach the classic example of passive aggressive. When I warn him on his criticism of my decisions, his response is he is not talking to me but his fellow coach and he is entitled to speak to his fellow coach. I warn him that once I hear him critical of my decisions it is dissent and to knock it off.
The rest of the blue sideline is also very mouthy.

So, when red player makes the comment, I call over red and as I am taking details ask him why it should not be a red card. I have already decided to give a yellow and tell the player I would often give a red for that comment but I am giving a yellow due to the behaviour of the blue sideline and in particular the coach. My rationale is their behaviour is contributing to the heat of the game and affecting the players.

Would you issue a red for the comment regardless of the match conditions and heat?

A lot to discuss here.

First of all, the coach was guilty of dissent and IFAB has empowered us to deal with dissent properly by issuing a caution. Where we used to do the ask, tell, remove, we now do the warn*, caution, send off. If sounds to me like you missed your first opportunities to warn and then failed to take the stone-wall opportunity to caution. A caution to the bench is still extremely effective because it is so novel.

Secondly, I would never, and I mean never, tell a player that he should be getting a red but he'll get a yellow because other players are behaving badly. What does that say about your credibility? What it says to me is that you've allowed yourself to be influenced by the bench. Not a good look.

Finally, match conditions and heat have some what to do with the decision between yellow and red in those "orange" circumstances. But calling someone the c-word is not an orange circumstance. That's a red card all day, every day.

 

[Joshref]

I cannot stress how much I disagree with this. Downgrading a card because off the oppositions behaviour is ****ing crazy.

Imagine if he’d have punched someone in the face. What would you have done? Just said “You see he wouldn’t have punched him if the blue manager wasn’t being annoying, so it’s a yellow card”

I find it even crazier you chose to tell them it’d normally be a red. As others have said, match control out of the window

 

[RefIADad]

A couple of comments here.

First, that comment to a player has to be red. There is no way to justify otherwise.

Regarding the passive aggressive dissent, deal with it quickly. I was an AR for a game last week. A player told her teammate “We have blind refs tonight.” I heard it from 10 yards away, and I called the center over to recommend a caution (which he issued). The player asked, “What did I say?” She thought that since it wasn’t directed to the crew that she was “safe”. Once we issued that caution, no additional dissent either directly or indirectly.

 

[RyantheRef]

A couple of comments here.

First, that comment to a player has to be red. There is no way to justify otherwise.

Regarding the passive aggressive dissent, deal with it quickly. I was an AR for a game last week. A player told her teammate “We have blind refs tonight.” I heard it from 10 yards away, and I called the center over to recommend a caution (which he issued). The player asked, “What did I say?” She thought that since it wasn’t directed to the crew that she was “safe”. Once we issued that caution, no additional dissent either directly or indirectly.

Yup. Dissent does not require the dissenter to speak directly to the one being dissented against. Actually, throughout history, the dissenter usually directs the comment somewhere else.