Our referees are the best in the world

[martyn ellis]

I firmly believe that we have honest referees, yes, they make mistakes, but they are having to deal with cheating players, whether this be at one end of the scale the diving, and at the other appealing for throw ins that are obvious should go to the other team. 

The problem is not the referees, but the players and their management.

Phil, with respect I think it's a combination of both. I really can't see how Halsey failed to appreciate a genuine effort by our defender to get out of the way of AY combined with a genuine attempt by AY to make sure contact and acrobatics were achieved. I'm not saying they never make mistakes; I just think they don't think objectovely enough in the heat of the moment and get caught up in the atmosphere. But so many of them are just plain awful, like Mike Dean's catalogue of bloopers against Stoke.

[Lambert and Payne]

If you've been a linesman then you'll be in agreement that 9 times out of 10 its boderline and very hard to judge
Atkinson could never be certain that the whole ball was over the line, he never should have gave it.
Yesterday Halseys postioning should have meant he could see Ashley Youngs dive, its not easy to see when someone does it, but that one was easy
Referee's have good games when there not at Old Trafford and the like, because match of the day covers 20 million angles and concludes the referee's wrong when it goes against the 'big teams'
I'd love to see a good decision highlighted as much a bad one

[Handsworth Wood Villa]

Referees are crap.

I accept human error and all that.

But I don't accept how referees always give a foul when an attacker slightly brushes a defender and the defender falls over.

Or how when a striker goes up for a challenge for the goalie and slightly brushes him, the goalie falls over and the ref gives a free-kick.

Are they really that gullible?

[frankmosswasmyuncle]

what about Wigans clear goal against united. Disallowed dont know what for.
Cieran Clark lying on the floor with a head injury, Ref plays on until MANYOO lose the ball. Or Heskey down holding his head and the ref plays on.

The ref not stopping the game with Clarkey on the floor until ManU lost possession was the perfect example for me of ref's favouring the "big" clubs over others. A player is either seriously hurt or he isn't. The ref let it go until "the good guys" fucked up then he brought it back. Forget the Ash dive, the ref should be slaughtered for letting an injured player lie there until that player's team gained possession.
What the fuck is that all about?

And it was interesting to notice that Evra had a little look at Clarke (who he'd just smashed in the head with his elbow) before going down himself clutching his head pretending they'd clashed heads. That's cheating and that's what technology should be used for. If it was rugby union Evra's actions would have been noted and  he would now be banned for a few games for his cowardly action.

I am not being biased, just appalled again at how shit so many of our refs and "great" players are ruining the game.

[pauliewalnuts]

Whenever I see Phil Dowd refereeing, I always think of that line someone on here used to describe him, "He should be driving a van", which communicates his inability to do his current job perfectly.

My beef with refereeing isn't that they make mistakes - that is human - it is when you see blatant double standards. An example yesterday was not stopping play for the head injury to Clark till United had finished their attacking move.

If that had been the other way around, and it had been Rooney on the ground, and us attacking at Old Trafford (try to imagine it), would he have done the same thing?

[pauliewalnuts]

Bugger, just like the poster above me said. Which I hadn't noticed.

[Fergal]

If the news started breaking that there was widespread corruption involving referees I would not be surprised.

[frankmosswasmyuncle]

And that cheating fucker Olssen would also be banned. He held Herd's foot which led to the unfair sending off which was rescinded. He then went on national TV and told millions that Herd had stamped on him.
Surely, even a complete fucking idiot can work out that is simply very very wrong and is bringing the game into disrepute. His punishment? Fuck all!
Will he do it again? Very likely. It's cheating and he's got away with it, so carry on doing it. The FA clearly don't care about making the game fair and just for all.

[simman]

 It is true to say that players and managers are also at fault but players have been at it for years and years well before Sky came along. I remember as a kid being totally disillusioned by Keegan when he played against us for Liverpool in the '70's. He had been held up as the ultimate professional by media at the time but spent the whole game whinging at the ref over every decision! One of the big differences then was that referees were not media 'luvvies' wanting to get on TV and in the papers. The other difference was that TV football was in it's infancy so every decision was not disected hundreds of times by 'pundits'.
It is really difficult to comment without it looking like sour grapes, however, I am convinced that referees are inclined to give decisions in favour of the 'top' teams because of how everything is so closely scrutinised by the media and the biggest draw for the media are the 'Sky 4 or 6'. The incident with Gabby vs Chelsea is clear, he won the ball fairly, the linesman, no more than 5 yards away, saw nothing wrong, Terry holds his hands up and gets a foul. On Sunday Young clearly dived, Clark was backing away yet the way Young went down suggested he had been involved in a crunching tackle. At Wembley there were 4 or 5 players lying on the line and yet the referee was convinced the ball had gone over because certain players (who I gather have already said they knew it wasn't a goal) appealled anyway.
The help for refs needs to come from the authorities as soon as possible. Managers will never show up their own players for cheating and players will always try it on if the gaffer says nothing and the ref gives it without question.
Goal line technology and retrospective bans for diving and other forms of cheating need to come in.
I still reckon I'd spend most of my time at Villa Park, moaning at the ref though! Can't remember the last one who had a decent game, no not one that gave us everything!!, just someone who managed the game with common sense and no fuss

[JUAN PABLO]

31 March 2012: Aston Villa v Chelsea. 50-50 ball near the touchline between Agbonlahor and Terry with the score at 2-2. Agbonlahor comes away cleanly with the ball, linesman does not flag; Referee Lee Mason acknowledges Terry's appeal from the ground by giving a free kick to Chelsea, who attack, get a corner and score.
7 April 2012: Chelsea v Wigan. Spirited performance by Wigan cancelled out by two clearly off-side goals from the home side awarded by referee Mike Jones and his sidekick running the line.
8 April 2012: Man Utd v QPR. Ashley Young, clearly in an off-side position, is 'felled' by the merest brush against Sean Derry and awarded a penalty. Derry sent off by referee Lee Mason and subsequent appeal against a ban rejected.
9 April 2012: Aston Villa v Stoke. Debatable free kick awarded to the away side with the score at 1-0. The resulting cross headed firmly into the net by Robert Huth courtesy of a huge lift-off on the shoulders of James Collins who is powerless to jump with the scorer. Villa's protests waved away by referee Mike Dean. The game finishes 1-1 and the relegation strugglers drop two vital points.
15 April. Man Utd v Aston Villa. In the 6th minute Villa's already difficult task is made nigh on impossible when Ashley Young, who learnt his tricks at Villa Park so why should we be so surprised, ghosts into the penalty area and makes a beeline for the boot of the retreating Ciaran Clarke over which he flings himself to massed demands for a penalty. Referee Mark Halsey, of Thierry Henri free kick fame and countless other outrageous decisions, predictably obliges - the boys in the studio concur 'you can't do that in the modern game' What? Dive? Or try and get your leg out of the way?
15 April. Chelsea v Spurs. FA Cup Semi Final, Wembley Stadium. An even and entertaining match, with little to separate the two teams apart from an exceptional Chelsea strike at the end of the first half, is ruined as a fair spectacle when the referee, Martin Atkinson sees the ball go over the Spurs goal line, even though no-one else does and even though repeated replays show it was in play all the time. John Terry pleads with the ref not allow the goal as it hit him and so couldn't have gone over, but his appeals fall on deaf ears. Mr Atkinson is sure and awards the goal (I made the JT bit up).
And so I could go on. I'm sure you can find plenty more game-changing examples of inept refereeing from the annals of Messrs Webb, Dowd, Probert, Clattenberg, Foy, et al. I really am getting sick of referee apologists. I've described these few cases of ineptitude all occurring within the last two or three weeks (there's only mostly Villa ones here because those are the ones that upset me the most). Anyone care to join in and challenge Roy Hodgson's claim that we have the best refs in the world?

there was the Derry one , over the line by 6 miles  , cant remember who against.

[Villanation]

The thing is this could so easily be dealt with which would take the kind of terrible decision making that happened yesterday out the loop.

Why don't they just do it, its almost as though they want to encourage potential corruption and/or bad decision making.

[frankmosswasmyuncle]

The thing is this could so easily be dealt with which would take the kind of terrible decision making that happened yesterday out the loop.

Why don't they just do it, its almost as though they want to encourage potential corruption and/or bad decision making.

This.
For me the most obvious offence that could be dealt with is all the pushing, shoving and shirt pulling at corners/set pieces that refs seem to completely ignore these days. If a player grabs another's shirt on the half way line it's a foul and usually given. Ironically, doing this in the penalty area is fine. This leads to confusion, relying on the ref's "interpretation" which muddies a really simple offence/punishment even more. Warn the player/s involved - if they do it again give a penalty/free kick and send the offender off. They'd soon clear up a load of shit, we'd all know what a foul is and the game would be better for it.

Van Persie has just kicked the fuck out of Di Santos and what did the ref do? F**k all!

And Di Santo has just scored!
Fuck!

[Clampy]

Halsey could have won a huge amount of respect yesterday if he'd have booked Young. Being the poor ref that he is though, he saw a red shirt go down, remembered where he was and took the easy option. Throw in the Clark incident and it was pretty spineless refereeing.

[wombat]

I've mooted this one before, it's radical but it would perhaps make your Ashley Young diver think again.

Each team can nominate a clogger, and then identify the oppositions cloggee. Your clogger is allowed 3 'free hits' if you will on the cloggee without retribution from your referee. So yesterday, no penalty and the 2 further hits to pole-axe Mr Young.

Sadly at the moment, nobody would bother identifying a cloggee for us!

That and goal line technology and we are sorted I think.

[Vegas]

Are our referees the best in the world?  There's no reason why they should be any better or worse than refs in other countries.  I personally don't have a clue whether there are more or less reffing errors here than in say the Bundesliga or Serie A. And I guess many of the people who have a strong view on this don't either.  And also I don't particularly care.

Are our refs crap / spineless / biased?  I don't think so.  It's a virtually impossible job to do perfectly - players deliberately trying to con the ref, a game that is incredibly fast, many decisions that are "shades of grey" that experienced pundits can't agree on after several slow motion replays.  And doing it to a standard of say 8/10 is not enough: the errors get repeatedly highlighted by TV replays, by managers and by fans.  The correct decisions pass without comment.

I think there is something in home-team bias as subconsciously anyone must be somewhat influenced by crowd noise / appealing etc. 

But even if people do think their standards are low, what can we do about it?  It's not like there are loads of better refs waiting in the wings, and refs went professional a few years ago now.