RefPlanet.com – Be A Referee!

17 Sep 2005
Scheduled for three matches, one as AR and two as Center (i'm now in a combined league which is considered U19, by the way). In these games, generally there isn't enough time to brief the ARs before the match, which turned out to be to my detriment in match #1.

Team A vs. Team D. In the second half, Team D, leading 2-1, takes a shot on goal, and from my perspective (head on, about 15 yards from the play), it looks like a defender instinctively puts her hands to her face to stop the ball hitting her, hits the ball, and just lets it drop whilst someone else kicks it away. The AR waves his flag, and i know why he's waving his flag, and i wave him down. He shakes his head no and puts the flag down, and i signal that i'll explain when i get a moment. If i had time before the match, i would have told him to let me handle all PK decisions (which is common practice among officials), but since i didn't tell him, he signaled for it, and i waved him down. From his angle, it looked like the player reached out to the side to control the ball with her hand, but for me it looked instinctive, and the player didn't try to gain an advantage (she didn't try to play the ball after deflecting it).

Surely enough, with one minute to go, Team A scores the equilizer on a brilliant through ball and individual run on a counter attack (the attacker appeared offside at first, but she was actually in her own half of the field when the ball was passed, nullifying the offside). Match ends 2-2.

The AR whose PK i waved down was not very pleased with at the end of the match. I should also mention that his daughter is a forward on Team D. Ohwell…i've seen worse handballs in the box go uncalled (i'm looking at you Diego).

In my second match, i was Assistant Referee. At this point, i should mention that earlier that morning, it rained and was generally cool. By the time my first match came along, the temperature had soared to over 30 degrees Celsius (for the Yanks in the audience, it was about 95 degrees Fahrenheit). That field was hot, and steamy. That said, i thought i had prepared myself well for the season.

I hadn't. I cramped up during the first half. I survived the remaining 15 minutes or so, and then asked to be removed at halftime. So i took a rest for the remainder of the match, so i could be ready for my third match, which was immediately following this one. I don't care what you say, i still get a cap! Just think of it as a 46th minute substitution ;)

So i took a break and stretched, and felt perfectly fine by the time my third match was to begin. Now, i was told that this was an U14 match, but these girls looked a bit older than 13…i certainly would not put them up against the teams i saw in my first game, whom i know are U14. Anyway, in addition to being larger than i thought, they were also mouthier than i thought, and one in particular was much lazier than a footballer should be, taking her sweet time on goal kicks in the first half (she was playing defender). The team took forever getting onto the field to start, but they weren't kicking off, so i warned then that i would start play in 30 seconds, and consequently started play before they were fully organized. I gave the back 4 and goalkeeper a general warning about taking too long on the goal kicks in the first half, to which the particularly mouthy one replied with a "friendly" abuse. Later on, the same mouthy one decided to kick the ball out of play on two consecutive plays, and argue that she didn't kick it out both times, to which i replied with a "friendly" warning. By halftime her team is already down 4-1.

Second half, the slow team now is kicking off, and are taking forever to get on the pitch, but they manage to successfully get two players onto the pitch who are willing to take the kick off, so i warn the team that i will make the two players conduct the kick off in 45 seconds, and if they delay the kickoff, i'll be forced to caution the player taking the kick. The players continue to stroll onto the pitch, with the mouthy one now playing goalkeeper and nowhere near her goal. 45 seconds passes, and the mouthy goalkeeper has barely made it to the penalty area, so since her team is kicking off anyway, i blow the whistle. These matches are on a very tight schedule, so i can't let them waste the league's time. Mouthy keeper spend about 3 minutes yelling at me from across the field about how i'm required to wait for her to say she is ready (that is a myth; the referee may wait for the goalkeeper, but doesn't have to when it is clear they are wasting time). I urged her to contact the league administrator about my irresponsible behavior. It is no coincidence that said league administrator regularly starts matches with only one team on the pitch if the other team is taking too long to get ready, so i'm not too worried about any consequences! Anyway, mouthy goalkeeper actually keeps a clean sheet in the second half, but her team only gets one goal back, and it ends 4-2.

Besides the cramping, good start to the season. I won't have any games this weekend or next, because i am off to England! My next match will be 8 October. See you then!

Career Appearances:
Referee: 73
Assistant: 34

Post edited 2:44 am – Feb 19 2011 by Chas

Sorry for the lack of updates…lots of stuff going on with me lately. Aside from classes, i've also been getting ready to start my full-time teaching job, teaching Earth Science/Geology for Grade 9 (and eventually Physics; for now i'm teaching Earth Science to fill a vacancy). But of course, i've also had matches, as well as a BIG update on my promotion, so i'll get right to it.

29 Oct 2005
The matches were canceled AGAIN due to weather on 15 Oct and 22 Oct, but finally after 5 weeks off (2 on holiday in England and 3 due to weather), i had a match in the center on the 29th.

I don't remember much, but i have my match report, so i do know that it was Blue v. Red, Red went down 1-0 early, but equalized making it 1-1 at halftime. Then the floodgates opened. Red scored in the opening minute of the second half, 1-2, though Blue would score three in a row, including one player completing her hat trick to make it 4-2 with 15 minutes remaining. Then out of nowhere Red makes their comeback, the equalizer coming off an own goal in the final 10 minutes. That own goal totally deflated the Blue team, and they ultimately lost 6-4. One of the assistant referees in this game is the guy who would eventually perform my assessment.

I also had a match with the same guy as an assistant on the 5th, though i remember nothing about it…

12 Nov 2005
This was the week of my (and another referee's) assessment. We did each other's games as ARs so that we could both have a full team. Anyway, for my match i read the Assessment checklist for promotion to Advanced Referee (one promotion ahead of mine) to make sure i would fulfil all the requirements. I had two of everything, i even wrote down my pre-match instructions to the ARs on the back of my data sheet so i wouldn't forget anything. I actually liked this idea so much that i plan to make a laminated card to carry in my pocket with my pre-match instructions on it, just to use for all my matches.

Anyway, the match went smoothly, except for one little incident where the ball had gone into touch and a player kept insisting that her team would get the throw, but i and the AR both agreed that her team touched it last, so she tossed the ball onto the field about 15 yards. I called her over, spoke to her briefly (she said she was throwing the ball to her cousin who plays on the other team), and cautioned her. I recorded it as dissent, though i guess it could have also gone in as delaying the restart, doesn't really matter. That team won the match 3-0, and my assessment went quite well.

Since i'm sure you're dying to know, the complaints against my refereeing were: my goal kick and corner kick hand signals look similar (i point straight ahead to the goal for goal kicks and point upwards and at the corner for a corner kick, which i guess could look similar from certain angles…in any case i shout quite loudly what the restart is as well, so the players are never confused), and I stay on my diagonal a bit too rigidly, when i should stray from it as the ball gets nearer to the goal area to be in a decent position to see goal mouth action.

The assessor liked that i talk a lot on the pitch (when there is some contact, or a player goes down, but there is no foul i shout out "fair challenge!" or "all ball!", and it's always obvious when there is a corner because i shout "CORNER!" loudly enough for everyone to hear. He also liked that i make decisions quickly and look like i mean it, so it makes it hard for players to try to argue or question, since i seem so sure of the call.

In any case, i passed, and on November 14th, 2005, my AYSO Intermediate Referee Certificate was issued. I now qualify to cross-register with USSF and officiate in paid matches!

19 Nov 2005
This was a particularly rough day, as i had my Praxis (national teacher certification) exams that morning, from 8:00 to 12:00 (i get the results next week, by the way). Anyway, i was still signed on for two matches in the center and one as an AR, so i made my way to Central Park from the World Trade Center area and did my matches. In my first match i ended up cautioning the same girl that i cautioned last week, this time for handling the ball in the penalty area. To be fair, she was the goalkeeper in the first half, and probably just had a bit of a lapse of judgment, because she literally jumped up and caught the ball, then realized her mistake and looked right at me. I cautioned her because she prevented an opponent from making a fair play for the ball, but i could not send her off for denying an obvious goal scoring opportunity because the ball was not on its way into the goal (to send her off, i would have had to believe that the ball was going directly in from the corner kick, which is a tough argument to make). In any case, the penalty kick sailed wide, the girl who was cautioned went on to score later in the match, and they won 2-0.

My second match in the center was the late match, bitter cold, sun setting, but we managed to get through it as it ended 4-3, the winner coming with 5 minutes remaining in the match.

Now i prepare for the Winter season complete with my new badge (which i will scan a pic of as soon as possible). I've truly come a long way since my last Winter Indoor season, when a division rep in Brooklyn took a chance on a complete stranger to officiate 24 matches in a volleyball gym next to the Brooklyn Bridge. I'm looking forward to showing him my new badge, earning my 100th cap in the centre, and once again justifying his decision.

Career Appearances:
-Referee: 79
-Assistant: 38

7 Jan 2006
Opening weekend of the Winter AYSO season in Brooklyn. I'm officiating two U19 Girls matches per weekend, although this week i volunteered to also officiate the first Boys U19 match, but i left before the second started. I might do all four next weekend.

The matches weren't particularly exciting, although the Boys match was pretty good because their goalkeeper was a great player, usually coming out to help on the attack. On one play in particular he made the save, put the ball down, and immediately dribbled down the field for an attack, catching EVERYBODY off-guard, and ultimately setting up a close range shot for a teammate which was saved.

Only two things to complain about. One, a coach (who also coached last season) came up to me before my first match and asked me to run mainly on one side of the field, because apparently players were complaining that i was in the way when moving around both sides of the field. I do recall being hit by a few balls last year, but they were always from frantic clearances where the player clearly wasn't aiming in any particular direction, and this being a small indoor field, the chances of me getting hit are increased. But in any case, i skewed my runs a bit to be more to one side, moving toward the middle as the ball got near the goal.

As a result, i ended up missing what might have been a goal during one match. The ball rolled away from the keeper after a save, to the line, but the keeper stopped it from going completely over the line, from what i could tell. I looked over at the sidelines to get the parent's reactions, and since they weren't jumping up and down screaming (either for or against), i just said 'no goal' (not that i would let spectators influence my decisions, of course). I doubt it went completely over anyway. But if i had just ignored the coach and did what i wanted, i would have been on the goal line to see it myself. Oh well…i don't think i'll be camping off on one side next week…

Second complaint, this one much easier to deal with. The AYSO indoor rules for this division state that there should be a "goalkeeper box" outlined by blue tape, 8 feet wide and 8 feet long, in front of goal, where only the goalkeeper may play. When i got to the field, it was clear that the U12s weren't aware of the correct size requirement, and put down boxes which were about 10 feet wide and 12 feet long. I ended up just using their boxes, and had to disallow a couple goals because players kicked the ball while it was over the line. There probably would have been no infraction had the boxes been the correct size. Anyway, i checked with one of the higher-ups at Brooklyn AYSO (who is also a referee), and he agreed that i may have the boxes corrected. I have plenty of blue tape, so i could just do it myself.

Anyway, more matches next week, and i might just get around to cross-registering with USSF soon :)

Career Appearances:
-Referee: 82
-Assistant: 38

11 Feb 2006
Ended up with two Boys games and my regular two Girls games. The Boys games were, as usual, frantic, as shown by my final scorelines of 10-8 and 11-8.

The first of the two Girls games wasn't particularly exciting, but the second one has to be Match of the Year contender so far for me. Black vs. Blue, (Black is that "Team B" from my previous posts). Black goes ahead 3-0 in the first half, before Blue gets one back right at the end of the first half. It looks like it's going to be 3-1 at halftime, but Black score a 4th literally just a few seconds after Blue scored their first. Then Blue started the march back into the match, before having their hopes dashed when Black scored to make it 5-3 with 5 minutes to go. Blue wasn't about to give up though, and made it a quite exciting finish, even pulling to within one goal in the final minute. But despite 5 minutes of stoppage time (i'll explain), the scoreline would remain 5-4.

Now, the excessive amount of stoppage time in an indoor match: in my previous post, i talked about the beginner girl on the Black team, who teams have begun to single out. Well, surely enough, it happened again in this match, only this time it wasn't a foul that triggered it. She was given the task of marking Blue's best striker, and actually was doing quite well, playing very physical, but legal, defense. The player she was marking, however, wasn't thrilled with defender's fighting spirit, and began to get frustrated in the second half, with plenty of pushing between the two of them. Simple enough, make the players aware that i'm watching them closely, on one restart in particular i delayed proceedings to have a word with both of them simultaneously, and then stood about 5 feet away from the two of them on that restart. But then the Blue player decides that the best way to avoid any further trouble is to switch sides with the other striker. Perfectly reasonable strategy, except for one thing.

She just would not shut up about it! She had to make a big announcement of it when she came up with the brilliant idea of avoiding this particular defender, and whenever the defender and she would end up near each other again, she would immediately yell out that she has to get away from the defender and tells her strike partner to switch sides again.

The defender, once again, is distraught by it all, but at least this time she just plays on instead of disappearing into a corner. From that point on, however, she wouldn't get quite as stuck in as in the first half, and it showed as Blue was able to creep back into the match as a result (despite trailing for the entire second half, Blue had almost all of the possession, and were dominating up front, save for the Black goalkeeper's amazing performance).

During the quarter break, i was informed by the division head (whose daughter was the phenomenal goalkeeper) that we had plenty of time until we had to leave the gym, so feel free to let the game go longer than usual. Considering his team was leading by two goals, i took this as genuine. But instead of just arbitrarily making the game longer, i decided to HEAVILY extend the quarter break, as the second half was getting very heated. Generally the watch keeps running during the quarters, but when we have plenty of time between games as we do in this league, i let the clock run but add the time on at the end. During the long break, i gave a talk to Blue's coach about the striker and the intimidation tactics, talked to the striker about the tactics, talked to the defender to make sure she was alright, and to remind her that she has been making good challenges for the ball and doesn't need to change anything, and talked to her coach (well, the division head actually, who was acting as her team's coach today) about the intimidation tactics i was noticing from yet another team against the same girl.

The last quarter of the match was just as intense, so i started to slow the game down myself by calling the match more strictly. I'm part of the "referee should interfere as little as possible" school of thought, and as such i tend to let the players play, but in this match i was calling fouls that i generally don't call in other matches. Not to say that i intentionally ignore fouls, or that today i was calling fouls that weren't there, but in this particular section of the match i decided to take a VERY strict interpretation of the laws. Whereas i generally call about 6-8 fouls in a typical match in this league, i ended up calling at least 6 in this quarter alone.

On the bright side, we got through a very exciting match with no cautions, and at the game's conclusion, both sets of spectators gave the teams a LONG standing ovation as a sign of appreciation for their efforts, something i have never seen in an AYSO match. I definitely look forward to hundreds more matches like this one :)

Now, as promised, news about my 100th cap in the middle.

I'm currently on 97 matches as a Center Referee. I'm scheduled for two matches on 25 February, but i generally could get Boys matches whenever i want. So i intend to officiate in the second Boys U19 match in the morning, so that my last Girls U19 match in the afternoon would be career appearance number 100! I sent an email out to the three assignors and two mentors i've had to give them the good news, since i can't really think of anyone else who would actually be happy about the accomplishment and understand its significance to me.

Anyway, i'm off this week…no games scheduled due to the holidays. In just 7 days, i will have reached a milestone. It might not be much, but you can be well sure that i'm proud of it.

Career Appearances:
-Referee: 97
-Assistant: 38

4 March 2006
Final week of the Brooklyn AYSO Winter season. This day definitely started off on the wrong foot. I walked 20 minutes to the train station, and got on the train, where i normally begin writing the standard information on my data sheets so that they're ready for match time (and some non standard information; for example, in addition to the start time for the match, i also write down when the second half would start, and when it should end, just in case i mess something up with my watch). I reached for the pencil in my front pocket…whoops…i forgot to bring it with me.

In fact, i had taken everything i needed to have on me and put it on my dresser, but then ran to do something else and completely forgot to take any of it with me! That includes: my AYSO badge, yellow and red cards, BOTH of my Fox 40 whistles (i carry two), and my AYSO coin. Fortunately, i have backups of everything, even a backup for my backup whistle, so i was able to cope. I wore my old Regional referee badge since i only have one Intermediate. My third whistle, however, is this thing called the Acme Tornado. It is seriously the worst whistle in existence. It used to be my backup whistle, but i can't stand it so much that i had to replace it. If you take anything from reading about my experiences, take this: don't EVER buy an Acme Tornado!

Anyway, the matches were all fairly straightforward. One oddity though, and i wonder how often this actually happens: i had an own-goal in ALL THREE of my matches! In the first one (Boys U19), the goalkeeper spilled a shot and, in his panic, swatted the ball into his own net. His team ultimately went down 9-4.

The second i actually don't remember much about. This was the match with the team whose player i sent off last week. Her coach (who is also her mother) apparently couldn't be bothered with the rest of her team, because she showed up about 20 minutes late, and her team only had three players at the opening whistle. They ultimately borrowed two players, including a male goalkeeper. If not for his brilliant play in goal, Green would have probably lost big. Instead, it goes down as a 2-2 draw.

The third own-goal was actually a brilliant shot (but aren't all own-goals?). Orange player (Girls U19) took a hard cross (which may have been a shot) and poked it first time into the top corner of the net. Keeper had no chance. If she had done it on the other end, it could have been a contender for goal of the season.

This was the match with the player who was kicked last week. I have to say, she has progressed by leaps and bounds in these last few weeks. She still plays very physically, but nothing illegal. Whilst she did commit a couple fouls, she was mostly successful in this match, even tracking up to the midfield to make some key passes. At one point the striker she was marking was getting frustrated, so i shouted out, "it was a clean challenge, you have to be stronger than that" to let her know that i'm not going to penalize someone simply for being bigger than her opponent. This particular striker is also very physical, and likes to bounce off of defenders. Today, however, she tended to bounce a lot harder than she is apparently accustomed! She was particularly annoyed with the fact that she couldn't bully this defender, because this defender was just as physical. Fortunately, nothing escalated in this match, and the striker in question scored a brace in the second half to earn a 6-3 win with her team.

Well, i suppose i'm on vacation now. Brooklyn has made it abundantly clear that they want me back for the Spring season, which starts for them on 9 April. I suppose i should see what the West Side Soccer schedule is going to look like in terms of how many matches i'm going to get (they begin on the 1st of April, unless they're trying to trick me), and which fields i'll have to travel to. I think i'd be disappointing a lot more people if i don't report to Brooklyn than if i left the Upper West Side. Hopefully i'll have a definite plan in the next couple weeks. Thanks for reading!

Career Appearances:
-Referee: 103
-Assistant: 38

17 March 2006
Finally got word from West Side Soccer. The matches will be on Sundays. So i agreed to stay with them and do a maximum of one Centre per week, but i'll probably get mostly AR assignments. Most of my refereeing, then, will be with Brooklyn AYSO's U19 Girls Division.

I also received word from Rutgers that they would like me to continue work with the Intramural League. I decided to be a little more creative with the website this year, and i think it looks pretty good.

I'm getting better with my long distance runs. However my right leg still gets very sore very quickly, making it hard to run for extended periods. Hopefully i'll fully recover soon.

Yikes…way too many games in the last couple weeks, and not enough time to write about them. Well, now i have some time, so let's see…

27 March 2006
Opening night for the Rutgers Intramural Soccer League. Eight teams composed of angry college students and alumni (mostly students). And one referee :)

I was given an "assistant" referee. He's not a licensed referee, but he's there to help, and i can't complain about that. Problem is, he carries a whistle, and tries to use it! I instructed him not to blow the whistle at any point, using the reasoning that my whistle is official, and i'd hate to have to overrule his decision and cause chaos where the players are concerned. I asked him to carry a flag, but he declined. This was a bad idea, because i can't really tell what he's signaling without the flag in his hands, aside from who gets the restart when the ball goes into touch.

Fortunately, opening night went fairly well, and the only times my assistant blew his whistle (…) were times when the ball quickly came back onto the field after going out, or for something for which i simultaneously blew the whistle. One of the teams didn't show up for their match, so i only did three games and just watched while the team that did show up played a practice match against whomever was willing to play them.

In the first match, the players on one of the teams kept trying to lobby for getting their opponents booked. I just ignored it today, but i plan to give pre-match warnings to players about sporting conduct for the next matches.

29 March 2006
Matchday 2 of the Rutgers Intramural Soccer League. I gave my pre-match talk to each team, so hopefully nothing stupid will happen. The matches went well once again; i'm definitely about 1308471405614 times better of a referee than i was last year! The final match was quite interesting…

Blue v. Red (the teams have names, but for simplicity's sake we'll go with colors). 1-1 and just about to begin stoppage time. Blue player dribbles into the penalty area. For some bizarre reason, a Red defender has the belief that referees are not allowed to call PKs in stoppage time. He puts his hand, arm bent, on the Blue player's shoulder and SHOVES him off the ball, fully extending his arm. He left me no choice. I pointed to the spot.

Queue over 40 seconds of complaining. The complaints, to my credit (i guess) were all along the lines of, "you can't call a penalty this late in the game!" The player who made the push even admitted he pushed his opponent, but still asserted that i can't make such a drastic call this late in the game. Maybe i'm crazy, but i could have sworn that a foul is a foul, whether it occurred in the first minute, the last minute, or any minute in between. Apparently i missed the referee courses that the Red team took prior to this match…

Anyway, PK converted, 2-1. Red gets the kickoff and fights for an equalizer. They ultimately get a corner kick, and score with an own-goal to equalize. They feel justice has been served. I honestly don't care. Final score 2-2.

I still have many more matches to post. Watch this space.

Career Appearances:
-Referee: 111
-Assistant: 38

Almost caught up!

3 April 2006
Rutgers Intramural Soccer League, matchday 3. Supposed to have four matches, but one team didn't show up, so we only had three games. During the time slot for the game that was forfeited, the team that did turn up wanted to play anyway, so they played a pick-up game with whomever wanted to play against them. I decided that this would be a good time to see what my assistant could do. I asked him to take the center for this game, and i took a flag and ran the line. I was hoping that 1) he could get some experience at this level, 2) i could show him what he more or less should be doing when acting as AR, and 3) i could determine how fit he would be to be the center for future games in this league.

Well, on the bright side, all three goals were accomplished. Unfortunately, my answer to goal number 3 is, "he isn't".

As much as the players moan during the games where i'm the center, i don't think they realise just how much i do for them in this league. My ability as a referee allows them to play a high level of football without fear of being killed out there. If they had to play every game in this league without a referee, the level of play would diminish greatly, so that the players could ensure their own safety and so that they could keep control of the game themselves. With me in the middle, they know things can heat up, and that i'll keep control of the situation for them. This match was a clear example of that.

Right away, first challenge of the match, right next to the centre ref (which, again, is not me; i'm AR in this match, although in my statistics i do not count this match). Player in White goes right through his opponent in Red. No call. I don't wave the flag, because it was right next to the ref.

Next challenge, same thing. This time i raise the flag, even though it's on the ref's side. At this point i have determined that the players are clearly testing the new official. I decide that i am going to be very strict with the flag with the hope that the ref will call fouls for the same types of things i call fouls for.

A little while later, and a player bends his body, reaches out near the ground, and blocks the ball on a pass with his hand. NO call!!! I raise the flag, the ref blows the whistle, and i gesture to my pocket to let him know that i think it should be a caution. Ref gestures back to me that he doesn't have a yellow card. Whatever, this match doesn't count anyway, and he was only expecting to be an AR tonight, so i take a step onto the field, make eye contact with the player, and hold up MY yellow card to make it known that he is being cautioned by the center ref. The cards are intended to be for communication purposes anyway, so i guess in theory it doesn't matter who holds it up, as long as it is clear to the player that he is playing with a caution.

Anyway, there is all kinds of holding, hard tackling, etc in this game, and lots of raised flags by me. At one point a player made a terrible sliding tackle that would even be a borderline send-off in an outdoor game. He already had a caution, so i gesture to the ref that i think he needs another caution and a sending-off. At the same time, i take a few steps onto the field in case there is retaliation. The ref comes to me and says he doesn't want to send off the player, so i just agree and go back to my position. Thank goodness the buzzer is going to sound any minute. When the buzzer does sound, i go to the score table, only to discover that the referee hasn't ended the game! He's adding time on! I run back to my proper position, and we play another 40 seconds or so. Oh dear…

The good news is, at least i could point to specific reasons now if i recommend he not take the centre again this season. Another plus: he now (sometimes) raises his flag high enough for me to see it, presumably because he saw how i raise the flag. And now that i see how he tends to make foul decisions, i might be less inclined to rely on him to make foul calls on his side when he is AR, which is what i had been doing. Overall, a decent learning experience. He doesn't cover the same range i do though (i ran from goal line to goal line as AR; he goes about halfway between the centre line and the goal line, in both directions). The saddest part about the match, though, is that this team won the Fair Play Award last year, and are currently leading the table this year! Although i guess, to their credit, it says a lot about them that they can adjust so quickly to the referee's style to suit their own needs for a match.

This post is fairly long, so i'll hold off on the one last day i need to update.

Career Appearances
-Referee: 115
-Assistant: 39

10 April 2006
I have always had a pilonidal cyst at the base of my spine. Over this weekend, it became infected and grow to 8cm in diameter. I would end up having surgery (the first of two) on the 14th, but in the meantime, i did my games on the 10th injured. I was able to stand, and able to run, so i put the pain aside and did my games.

Oh dear…what a first game i ended up with! The game was between the teams tied for first and second places in the league. We'll call it White v. Black.

The match was rather physical from the start, and i was calling quite a bit of fouls. I specifically warned one player, White's captain, for his manner of play. Other than that, the first half was uneventful.

The second half, on the other hand, was INSANE! First of all, Black was on attack, outside of the penalty area. White commits a foul, so i make the call. I don't know why, but for some reason, the White goalkeeper left his goal to argue the call (only about 6 meters, but in an indoor game i suppose that's quite a bit). At pretty much the same time, Black put the ball down on the exact spot where i pointed for the position of the foul and took a fairly quick restart (about four seconds between my whistle and the restart. The goalkeeper realized what was going on and ran back toward his goal (about 6 meters to cover, but he's not the most fit person on the pitch). Meanwhile, Black took two passes, and finally put the ball in the back of the net. I don't see any problems here, so i point to the center.

Naturally, i get surrounded by White, so i just backpedal my way to the center. Just before they take the kick-off, the captain picks up the ball and puts it (lightly, of course) into my chest. Then he says, "Thank you very much, your team won." I assume he was being sarcastic. In any case, i sent him off.

The team decided they would follow the captain's lead and walk off the pitch. One player gave me the middle finger, so i went ahead and sent him off. Then another player decided to scream at me and curse me out for a good 45 seconds. I just stood there and took it, and when he was done, i sent him off. He then decided he wasn't finished and continued screaming at me, including asking me to "come outside" with him, which i guess means he wants me to have my allergies. To be fair though, he was doing it while walking over to get his belongings and leave, so i can't complain too much.

This situation was getting annoying, so i decided to talk to the team that just scored. I told them that i want the game to continue, and asked if they would be upset if i disallowed the goal and gave a dropped ball (i wasn't sure if i could erase all the post-free kick activity and give the same free kick, so i figured the dropped ball on the 6m line would be sufficient. Keep in mind this is indoor, so the 6m line is not the same as the edge of the 6 yard box in outdoor). Strangely enough, they actually agreed. It helped that they saw me send off three players (although one was a substitute).

So we're about to get started again, and only 4 minutes to add on! When Black saw four White players line up (six players per team, so they were expecting three), they started arguing with the White players. Somehow this argument moved from the spot of the dropped ball to the center circle. I told the teams, "if we don't start in two minutes, this match is over." Surely enough, two minutes later, order could not be restored, and the next match had to start in about ten minutes. I gave up, re-allowed the goal (as play STILL had not restarted), walked to the center circle, told the teams there would be a kick-off, let them argue for another 5 seconds, and blew the whistle and put an end to this debacle. Three yellow cards (two had nothing to do with this incident, the third was for the White goalkeeper, as he completely left the gym and never came back, whereas his teammate only left the field, and briefly at that), three red cards, and an unfinished game.

The league administrator ultimately let the result stand at 1-0, and all the statistics in the match were allowed to count. Only one match bans were given to the sent-off players. But anyway…ARGH!

Fortunately, the other two matches were nice and quiet.

Career Appearances
-Referee: 121
-Assistant: 39

So, did anyone else put their uniform on and test everything tonight before going to bed? :p

Tomorrow is Opening Day for the NCSA (and effectively the official restart of my career). I've got 5 games in two locations: Two U19, two U11, and a U13 (the latter in which i will be the referee; AR in the others). I called the other refs earlier in the week, called the coaches for the match i'm centering (just to introduce myself and confirm the time and location). One of the refs i'm working with (4 of the 5 games) seems even more excited than i am, so that's a plus!

I've got my RefTalks all set up (just need to be put on and turned on), RefsCall batteries are fresh, uniforms vacuum-packed, boots cleaned…i think i'm ready to go!

And for those of you who are jealous of my long story ;) you can start your own in the Referee Blogs section of RefPlanet.com. It's okay to be the first :(