The Ref Stop

refsix - the Smartwatch and Mobile app for Referees

Hassan Rajwani

Hassan Rajwani

New Member
Hey all, I'm the founder of refsix - a smartwatch and mobile app for Football Referees. It's been a few months in development and testing and we finally launched our Beta a few weeks ago and plan to have the final product in time for the September. It's an app that allows you to log fixtures and teamsheets on your mobile, record key match incidents in the game and then view results and statistics afterwards. We've already started to partner with leagues and competitions too such as the SuperCupNI (previously known as the Milk Cup) as well as a National League to be announced next month. It's been used at the ECFA National College Cup Finals as well as by a Premier League referee on a University Varsity match too!

Would love to hear your thoughts and questions!

You can see the video here:



And more details at: www.refsix.com

Cheers,
Hassan
 
The Ref Stop
It certainly looks very useful, but I can see two potential issues ..

- you need your phone with you on the pitch and turned on. Whilst you can have it on silent you can't have it in airplane mode as that would break the link to the smartwatch. Some football authorities are very anti-technology and would frown upon having your phone with you on the pitch. For example, contrib directives are (unless they have changed recently) that phones must be turned off from when you arrive at the ground to when you leave)

- the cost. £180 for an app is eye wateringly expensive. Most referees would baulk at paying that for a device that does everything your app does, but for an app with no hardware provided you are never going to sell in any kind of volume at that price I'm afraid.
 
if it requires your phone on the field with you then it fails the requirements of Law 5 under the new set of laws.
 
The GOREF app is free, looks pretty much the same apart from the heat map etc and you don't need your phone as your iPhone via Bluetooth transfers data to Apple Watch and once game over you transfer all back to iPhone. I've not used mine in a game yet but appears to be well built
 
Apologies for the delay in responding! Wasn't getting notifications sent to my e-mail :(

@BethanyArcher - Yes it can work on your Galaxy Gear - give me an e-mail at hassan@doublesix.co

@RustyRef and @ASM - you actually don't need your phone with you during the game - you can leave it in the dressing room. Also the £180 price tag includes a Sony Smartwatch 3. You can also just get the app on an annual £30 a year subscription. Hope that helps :)
 
RustyRef said:
For example, contrib directives are (unless they have changed recently) that phones must be turned off from when you arrive at the ground to when you leave).
Click to expand...

in what day and age does your phone have to be switched off? im really sorry, but my phone stays on - its on vibrate when in the board room pre match and post match, and whilst out on the FOP doing pre match instructions etc - then it goes on loud in the changing room - my missus gets told when im off for warm up and match etc so she knows anything is wrong then to ring my mum/dad/brother/sister etc and ill call when I finish.
 
Charlie Jones said:
in what day and age does your phone have to be switched off? im really sorry, but my phone stays on - its on vibrate when in the board room pre match and post match, and whilst out on the FOP doing pre match instructions etc - then it goes on loud in the changing room - my missus gets told when im off for warm up and match etc so she knows anything is wrong then to ring my mum/dad/brother/sister etc and ill call when I finish.
Click to expand...
It's in the Contributory League manual of guidance...
Once all three / four Officials have arrived at the ground, all mobile telephones must be switched off and not turned on again until leaving the dressing room after the game.
I think the idea behind it is that it prevents match fixing and also is just another distraction - after all, once we're at the ground, that should be our focal point until we are finished. Having it turned off means there aren't any distractions.
 
Good idea - wouldn't use it though.

When cautioning or even sending off a player, I want to keep eye contact for the majority of it. The only time eye contact would break, is for me to quickly input information into my notebook.

Using this watch, I spend most of the time looking at my watch, scrawling through the options. It does look quite lengthy in process too.

Oh, and I don't really have a need to track my fixtures or cautions etc... MOAS and WholeGame does that for me.
 
Charlie Jones said:
in what day and age does your phone have to be switched off? im really sorry, but my phone stays on - its on vibrate when in the board room pre match and post match, and whilst out on the FOP doing pre match instructions etc - then it goes on loud in the changing room - my missus gets told when im off for warm up and match etc so she knows anything is wrong then to ring my mum/dad/brother/sister etc and ill call when I finish.
Click to expand...

As CA has said, at contrib and above. In practice most officials leave it on silent in their suit pockets, but it would certainly be frowned upon to be seen actually using it. A Football League official was suspended last season for using his phone at the ground.
 
In terms of other reasons, it's also ensuring isolation from outside influences. The higher you go, the more likely that matches you are officiating on have live Twitter feeds, and even videos of KMDs uploaded within minutes of the event happening. A video of a penalty decision in the first half could be on Twitter by half-time. Officials need to ensure that they are not put in the position where they could be accused of looking at such things.
 
I will admit guys, you have shown me why the higher up you go that these are in place.

thanks
 
It does look interesting.

But as others have said, could be a bit fiddly scrolling through various screens etc.

And certainly at the lower levels of football when you're not guaranteed to a get a team sheet and are expected to follow the proper procedure when issuing a caution or dismissal it wouldnt negate the need to use a notebook or similar.

However that being said, I am a bit of a tart when it comes to gadgets, so I'd definitely Italy look at something like this when/if I move a bit further up the refereeing ladder.
 
if you have multiple cautions a quick check of your notebook tells you if its a second one, not sure you can do that with this watch
 
Quick flick of the watch and u can see who's been caution and scored, no need to go into ur pocket

Best thing I liked about it, was I didn't have to do any administration after the matches :) cause it went straight back to the person's who were dealing with cautions and scores in the office as soon as I walked into the changing room after the game threw Wi-Fi or 3g
 
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