5%Villa -Phil Dowd

[hawkeye]

He is an absolute disgrace. That Sammon red card was beyond belief.

Ridiculous comment.

If you make an honest mistake in your line of work would you expect to be called an absolute disgrace?

Referees make mistakes. I agree that they should ultimately be held accountable for their performances, (just as anyone in any job should) but to dress it up as anything more than that is crazy.

He's a disgrace to refereeing, as he manages to combine getting big decisions frequently incorrect with that horrible "look at me, centre of attention" approach that the worst referees frequently have.

Exactly, he wants to get involved in the game, loves himself. The best refs you dont notice, Dowd is the opposite-wanker.

[pooligan]

I agree with Paulie, the prick is a disgrace to refereeing and i have thought so for a long time.I remember a few years back in a game against West Ham at Villa Park him giving a penalty against us when the Villa player think it was Delaney or Hendrie had his back to the ball. When ever i see he is in charge of us i am dissappointed as its almost certain he will make a big error usually against us. In fact ethe game against Bolton is the first game i can remember us winning and even then he managed to book Gabby wrongly i believe and get him suspended for the Liverpool game.

[Karlos96]

Dowd is an awful referee I'll never forgive him for the League Cup Final.  What annoys me with the ref's now is how a lot of them especially ones like Dowd just love being the centre of attention, leading the teams out like they think everyone has turned up to see them.  When I was growing up I could hardly name any ref's which is how it should be.

[Fuse]

"Best ref is the young guy - not Atwell - but the ref we had against QPR. Has a really strong backbone and does not get swayed by personalities or crowds." - Fuse.

It tells its own story that the one competent referee you know is the only one who's name you don't. How it should be.

Exactly. Wish the refs were all like him. No doubt he will probably get destroyed by a Ferguson or Dalglish for giving a pen against them and be banished to the lower leagues.

I'd be interested if the refs in the lower leagues are as inept but we just don't hear about it in the press or whether as I suspect, they are a whole lot better.

One thing which has definitely changed is years ago we used to slag foreign referees for their performances when British teams played in Europe. Nowadays the foregin refs show ours how its done and it is for 2 reasons:

1) they realise they are the ref and not the centre of attention or expected to be a personality

2) they don;t give a shit of it is Rooney, Terry or Ferguson or Dalgish - they call it as they see it and we don't get the amount of injustice we do in the PL. Whether our refs are corrupt is difficult to say but one thing they are is starry-eyed and try to impress the managers and players of the big clubs. Drives me up the wall.

[brian green]

On Boxing Day my family and I watched Cambridge Utd play Braintree Town.   The referee was a woman and I think it was the lino who Andy Gray got into trouble over.   She was okay.   Bit late on the whistle to home crowd shouts and the Braintree players took the piss a bit but on the whole she was competent.   The Cambridge crowd on the other hand drove us mad with unfunny stereotypical sexist abuse,   Unfunny is the important word in that sentence.

[Dave Cooper please]

On Boxing Day my family and I watched Cambridge Utd play Braintree Town.   The referee was a woman and I think it was the lino who Andy Gray got into trouble over.   She was okay.   Bit late on the whistle to home crowd shouts and the Braintree players took the piss a bit but on the whole she was competent.   The Cambridge crowd on the other hand drove us mad with unfunny stereotypical sexist abuse,   Unfunny is the important word in that sentence.

Sian Massey? She's reffed a couple of games at Tamworth and has always looked very good ( refereeing wise, I ain't no sexist!). Why any fans think she hasn't heard their oh so witty abuse countless times before I don't know. I even heard her answer a fan who shouted "Give it up love and go and get me dinner on." with, "The last thing you need is more food mate." Cue said fan getting pelters off his own fans and shutting up for the rest of the game.

[Percy McCarthy]

That's brilliant Dave.

[PeterWithesShin]

I blame You Are the Ref for turning us all into experts!

Oh for the heady days of old when the only ref most people knew was Clive Thomas. Rather than the media attention seeking twunts we get now.

[Exeter 77]

I remember a few years back in a game against West Ham at Villa Park him giving a penalty against us when the Villa player think it was Delaney or Hendrie had his back to the ball.

That may have been the game at Sunderland when Elleray gave a penalty when the ball hit Delaney on the shoulder blade.

[olaftab]

is he the one who had recovered from cancer a while back ?

No he is the one who has not recovered from being useless!

[Andy_Lochhead_in_the_air]

Oh for the heady days of old when the only ref most people knew was Clive Thomas. 

Oh yes, Clive `The Book` was without doubt the name we all remember. The other I recall was Roger Kirkpatrick who had a big moustache and  looked a bit like Jimmy Edwards.
The big name of the 1950s was Arthur Ellis. Better known to those of us as kids in the 1960s for being on `It's a Knockout`. They should start that up again (Stuart Hall is still around) and pack Dowd off there.

[hawkeye]

in the same game as the "incident" she gave one of the worst offside decisions ever, but no one remembers that. I have no problem with female officials, when I was playing we had a few just breaking through and they were as good and as bad as thier male counterparts

[Somniloquism]

Video of incident here

Whilst I do think Dowd is a ******, I can see why both of those were given on one viewing at normal speed. I hadn't seen either before but it did look like an elbow at first, especially with O'Shea(?) reacting like he did. And it was hard to tell that the tackle wasn't in or out of the box either. These seem to show more that we need to look at giving refs televisual aids for these decisions as Footy is now the last major sport in this country that doesn't use it for major decisions.

[taylorsworkrate]

The thing is that we are all experts nowadays when it comes to referees.

We get to see an incident from 4 different angles, in slow motion.

A ref gets to see it once, at full speed, and not necessarily with a good view depending on how quickly the direction of play has changed. I also believe that a large no of players have become incredibly adept at cheating.

Yes they make mistakes, and some seem to be poor at their job. They should be held to account for their performances without question. However, to be called wankers, ****** and disgraces for this is not a reasonable response. Its a game of football when all is said and done (despite the money involved).

I don't think any ref goes out to purposely make mistakes or favour a given side. I also don't think they like to make themselves the center of attention, but come across that way as the media and managers draw so much attention to the referee.

[Somniloquism]

in the same game as the "incident" she gave one of the worst offside decisions ever, but no one remembers that. I have no problem with female officials, when I was playing we had a few just breaking through and they were as good and as bad as thier male counterparts

Really, ever? Maybe I'm thinking about a different incident but she gave offside when he was slightly better then level, (never mind that it is hard for a linesperson to be sure of the exact right angle of a pitch to get an exact line).