I’m a committed moderate, passionately middle-of-the-road.
The problem is that sounds funny. As we’re currently witnessing in politics, it’s easier to be bold, confident and simple if you’re not in the centre ground. We moderates instinctively shy away from the kind of intemperate, strident or downright outrageous statements that tend to grab attention.
Politicians, of course, are sometimes held to account for their statements and promises. As are some people in football (though how a prominent manager can get away with claiming a conspiracy against his team is beyond me). But for fans, the world of messageboards and social media represents the ultimate of freedom without accountability.
The announcement of Alex Neil as City’s manager sparked a barrage of outrage and scorn, mainly directed at David McNally. After ‘getting lucky’ with Paul Lambert, he’d done nothing for the club, he was an over-paid muppet who should be hounded out and he and the board had clearly settled for being in the Championship. (At one point I posted a spoof comment asking how he had the audacity to appoint someone I’d never heard of – but it was so typical of the real comments that some took it seriously.)
No-one is held to account for this garbage. It would be nice if some of those fans now held up their hands and apologised, but we shouldn’t hold our breath. (At this point I’d better acknowledge the large slice of humble pie I’ve eaten over Sebastien Bassong.)
Fortunately, we have two people who ignore the clamour and get on with their jobs. One is Alex Neil and, of course, the other McNally. The chief executive’s five complete seasons at Carrow Road have seen two promotions, 11th and 12th places in the Premiership and one relegation. It’s already an impressive record and if we go up this year it’ll be a sensational one.
Alex and David manage the trick of being both deep thinkers and decisive managers. It’s a rare combination – too much thinking usually hampers action. Shakespeare isn’t often quoted on this forum (a serious shortcoming on the part of the editor, I’d say), but as usual he has an eloquent line: “The native hue of resolution is sicklied o’er with the pale cast of thought”.
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In the televised leaders’ debates before the 2010 Election – back when David Cameron thought they were ‘essential to democracy’ – the mantra became “I agree with Nick”. For people like me, the mantra on this forum tends to be “I agree with Mick”.
Except on one issue where I know we disagree: video review during games. Mick rightly points out that the continuous nature of football makes it different from other sports which use reviews, and that it would be very hard to draw the line as to which decisions should be reviewed.
And yet, it seems to me that our game – so professional in many ways – brings frustration and derision on itself by getting key decisions wrong and refusing the opportunity to get them right. With so much at stake, this is criminal neglect.
Let me be clear on one thing: I do not primarily blame the officials. Linesmen – yes, I know they’re ‘assistant referees’, but I can no more use that term than call the River End ‘the N&P Stand’ – are supposed to simultaneously see a pass struck and the position of the players 30-40 yards away. I’ll make a bold and strident statement here: it’s a physical impossibility.
Refs are making split-second calls on events happening at a speed far greater than it used to be (watch videos of football in the Seventies if you don’t believe me). It would be hard enough if players were honest about what’s occurred – but to varying degrees, they’re intent on conning the officials.
Of all the people being short-changed by the lack of technology in the game, I’d say match officials are the biggest sufferers.
We have a way to combat the con artists and bring better decision making to the game we love. In both the Premiership and Championship, and I assume in the other divisions too, we’ve seen an unacceptably large number of important calls wrongly made. In many cases the play naturally stopped after the incident in question, and it would have been child’s play for the ref or fourth official to take a look at video replay before committing to a decision.
I’m far too moderate to pretend it’s all plain sailing. What about the incidents where play does not naturally stop? Or those where, after umpteen slow-mos, we still can’t tell what really happened? These are real hurdles and to overcome them might involve some tweaking in the way the game works. But for me, we’re paying too high a price for keeping the status quo.
Shakespeare must have had something to say about it. There’s the bit about a pair of star-crossed linos, but I can’t find the perfect one. It’s in my mind’s eye…
Excellent, considered views Stewart, enjoyable read!
The technology, in my opinion, should be limited to the goal line only to determine whether or not a goal has been scored. Anything else is often subjective or a matter of interpretation.
Stewart – I think last week’s combination of the PM being grilled by Paxo and the Richard III events in Leicester must have been your inspiration?
Mistakes have been made by McNally (Adams appointment, RVW signing..) but to err is human, to forgive, divine. Every CEO in history can be accused of that (as can every manager) – it’s those that get it right more of the time than wrong that come up smelling of roses.
With the modern media spotlight on every word spoken and action taken, it’s easy for a few tweets or a couple of comments to be taken as representing the majority. After all, wasn’t it the Bard who said, “When the seagulls follow the trawler…”
Has the use of technology spoiled rugby and cricket? If anything, it’s livened them up a bit. It has to happen in football and the sooner the better.
Hi Stuart,
Was this the passage you had in mind?…
Is this a flag which I see before me,
The handle toward my hand? Come, let me clutch thee.
I raise thee not, and yet I doubt it still.
Art thou not, active striker, in line
Upon the striking of the ball? Or art thou but
A foot or two beyond, a false decision,
Proceeding from the crowd-oppressèd brain?
Would that I might see thee again, in the form
Of images replayed endlessly upon a screen.
Thou wouldst marshall me the way that I was to go,
And how such a flag I was to use.
Mine eyes are made the fools o’ th’ authorities,
FIFA and the rest. For there’s no such thing.
It is a bloody business which betrays thus mine eyes.
Some valid points raised, Stewart, especially with the (lack of) introduction of technology. Rugby is almost as fast-paced as football, and it (video technology) has been used for ages – with precious few complaints.
I replied to one of Gary Gowers posts recently, on which you’d commented also – suggesting that he may have found a valid ‘understudy’? And lo and behold, a few days later, you get to do your own columns! {My invoice is in the post 😉 }
The difficult thing about use of video tech is the question of where it begins and ends. The goal line device is specific for those (rare) incidents, and so it can go no further. But, if you use it for any contentious decision you could arguably hold up the game and have people demanding the use of it for all kinds of things.
It seems very odd that football absolutely refuses to entertain it during matches, though. Mark Lawrenson’s point about the WC final in 2006 – that the ref didn’t see Zidane’s assault and was informed by another official – proves that refs can benefit from outside help. There was no official acknowledgement of what happened, however, which leads me to another point. Let’s say a decision is challenged early in a match and then overruled; what that would say, to everyone, is that the official had got it wrong, and that would undermine him/her for the rest of the match. If it was left to the ref to decide whether to consult a replay there would be pressure to do that with every decision.
The ref makes the decision to ask for clarification in rugby, and that seems to work very well. But there’s a big difference between rugby and football: discipline and respect for officials. It works in rugby because the players just get on with it and they don’t hassle, surround and do their best to intimidate the ref at every opportunity.
Many people say football should use modern technology, but without saying how, with so many questions unanswered. My view is that it should be down to the ref to decide whether or not to consult someone with view of a replay, and only in a major incident. But first the disciplinary side of the game needs to be sorted out.
JD (5) – Always listen to our readers 😉 But naturally assumed you were Stew’s agent!
GG
One view I have always had is that when a referee sends a player off, it makes such a big change to a game (sometimes a bigger change than a goal being scored) that the sending off should be for say 5 minutes while the decision is reviewed by the forth official. If it is found to be incorrect the player should be allowed to return to the match. It is changes like this that could allow the introduction of technology without continually holding up the game.
Thanks, all – as before, the comments are better than the article!
Kevin (4): that’s the one! Unlike David McNally, I forgot to look to Scotland.
Jon (5): I pay my invoices promptly.
Gary (2) & Ben (6): I do appreciate the practical difficulties. But I’ll tell you this. If Millwall’s penalty a few weeks ago – visible as a dive from 100 yards away – had cost us points, I’d have been livid then and I’d still be livid.
Gary (7): my agents are everywhere.
We are indeed fortunate that McNally sought out the role which he now fulfils so adroitly!
I can understand Mick’s argument against the further use of technology. Goal-line technology now appears to be accepted, and from post match analysis, works perfectly. Every time a goal is scored that little device on the referee’s wrist lights up “GOAL”. What post, and indeed during, match analysis on TV also shows us is what very good decisions linesmen (and women) make as a matter of course, tight offside decisions being correct in the vast majority of cases and decisions so quickly ratified.
However, the argument about football being continuous is flawed, the game is not. It is littered with un-necessary stoppages in play whilst the clock continues to run down and player X decides that he needs a little rest, the ref is unconvinced, comes over to check, is ignored by the player signalling for vital life-saving injections of fluid, ref calls on trainer, magic sponge, spray, fluid or whatever is applied and hey presto! within seconds recovery is complete!. In the meantime the crowd at the ground, and the millions watching at home, wait patiently for the game to restart. If the powers that be can tolerate this acceptance of the petulant overpaid player’s behaviour, then surely we can spare the moments it would take for the fourth official to check out SkyGo to confirm a correct, or incorrect, decision had been made.
I’m not going to argue which decisions could or should be open to challenge, but the paying audience, surely, would rather the correct decision be made at (relative) leisure than an incorrect decision in haste.
It seems odd that the Goose (Sky/BT whoever) which laid this golden egg has the means to confirm the very good decisions which officials make, but is unable to help them.
On the technology debate (I’ve never seen two people agree on this thorny matter), why not do what they offer in tennis. Each manager has 2-3 challenges per match for referral to a video ref assisting the pitch ref? This would stop the player harrassment of the pitch ref, restrict limitless use and focus on the big contentious incidents only.
One problem in all this and its name is Blatter.
Mike C (10): good, thoughtful comments.
I’m conscious I’ve put some words into Mick’s mouth. He’s more than capable of speaking for himself – as we know – and I hope he’ll find time to respond.
Paul (8): another interesting idea. Incorrect red cards can be rescinded, of course, but the team involved has still suffered wrongly during the match. Your idea would be a welcome improvement.
Interesting discussion on the use of technology. For me the rugby argument raised by Jon is decisive. If technology can be used successfully in rugby, then it also can in football.
If the should it be used question is answered positively, then the far more contentious question is how. There are some good suggestions here – I like the idea of a red card review too. But it seems to me the main areas of concern are really in and around the penalty box and then card decisions, especially red cards. If, as in rugby, the ref asks for a review of a situation/ decision in the penalty box, then that should go a long way to sorting out the major issues. So, when John Ruddy drops the ball into the net, there should be an automatic review of what happened and whether he was obstructed or not. Similarly, any penalty situation should be automatically be reviewed.
On the discipline question, raised by Ben K, it seems to me that much of the ill-discipline takes place simply because in the absence of technology, players are trying to influence the referee. However, if a review is being undertaken, there is no gain for the players in trying to intimidate the ref, and they will do it less. in fact, it would then be easy to add that if a decision is being reviewed, and players don’t accept the outcome and continue to try and argue with the ref, then they should be yellow carded or sin binned.
I think the use of a sin bin would also be helpful, especially, in the case of offences seen through technology evidence, eg if a player is seen as blatantly diving in a review, then they should go off the pitch for 5-10 mins before they can come back on.
There is much to debate, because no clear set of recommendations has been made before – but the should question, when the technology available, has to be yes.
Be careful what we wish for chaps. Refereeing howlers are part of the game, always have been always will. Just as strikers missing open goals are, goalies letting shots in through their legs are, and defenders committing stupid fouls gifting penalties away.
One thing that is certain, of the 25 blokes who go out for a match, only 3 are truly honest. Some may be better than others, but at least they’re not the ones trying to cheat, or con opponents and officials.
Great article Stewart. I’ve long enjoyed your reasoned contributions on this site. However, today you’ve really annoyed me. The first tier of English football is called the Barclay’s Premier League, as has been the case since 2007. I don’t understand how people still get it wrong (along with the pronunciation of Berahino, the list goes on, yeah I know, I have a problem). The worst offenders are the Premier League managers, who are paid handsomely to work in the Premier League, and stand in front of advertising boards which display, dozens of times, the words “Barclay’s Premier League.” I think points deductions are in order.
I never understood the logic which concluded that McNally et al were just employing managers on the cheap to save money, and weren’t that bothered about getting back to the Prem. If anyone knows anything about football they know that the Premier League is where the big money is. That argument is complete nonsense. Those people may as well deny the moon landings or climate change while they’re at it. I’d hold them in the same regard.
Neil (15): Thanks for the kind words.
How could I repay such generosity by annoying you? A shocking omission, I agree. As excuse I can only offer that, as a Norwich fan, I sometimes get out of practice with the top flight.
Dan (14): Absolutely agree about officials’ integrity. But why shouldn’t we – for their sake as well as ours – use the tools available to help them improve the quality of decisions? You don’t quite say that bad decisions even themselves out, but almost. My problem with that is we tend register the decisions that go against our team and forget the ones that go for us; as a result, we all feel frustrated and angry at officials. They deserve better.
I think the debate within football is over. Increased use of technology will come — not quickly, or soon, but there is a tide in the affairs of men and the tide is moving in one direction.
As a point of information (Cosmo P, 11), it’s not Blatter who can delay things. Law changes are in the hands, not of FIFA, but of a separate entity: International Football Association Board, on which the British FA’s have a disproportionately large representation.
My doubts revolve around the impact increased technology will have on grassroots football. Refereeing, like policing, operates by consent. The person who rocks up to ref a kids’ game, or a Sunday morning fixture of the Capital Canaries fine side, is appropriately experienced and competent for the level of the match, and shouty dads or angry players know that, however irate they get, they have to put up with the ref deciding what has occurred. It’s a pretty fragile consent, but thousands of games take place each weekend, facilitated by a ref doing his or her best.
My experience is that, as the minutiae of Premier League decisions have been dissected more and more by ‘experts’, so the consensus of consent by players and spectators at grassroots matches has become damaged. The shouty dads and angry players arrive with a different mindset: that even the best refs are useless.
When (not if) refs don’t make decisions in the Prem, but instead wait for a bloke in the stand to watch a telly, I fear the Sunday morning attitude will be: “The ref can’t possibly know what happened, so we can’t accept his ruling”.
But it’s coming.
Mick (17) there is a counter to this. The fact that technology is used in international rugby matches I don’t think affects attitudes of players and their parents in local club games. In fact, one could argue that it is the sight of Premier League players disputing every decision made by the ref that leads to the sense of entitlement at the grass roots that decisions can be questioned too. So what if the use of technology stopped this, and instead people saw Prem players starting to get on with the game, rather than questioning every decision? Might this not be the factor that influences the attitudes of parents more?
Mick(17)- never heard of IFAB, i will confess. However Herr Blatter has more power than you make out. FIFA has 4 votes out of 8 and for a motion to be passed, it must have a min. of 75% of the votes.
Therefore, the British FA’s can get nothing passed without FIFA’s agreement!..and the IFAB are based in Zurich!
Tech. in footy is a bit like safety belts in cars (for those old enough) – when they were proposed, scare stories were rife about how it would make things worse and wasn’t practical. As with any revolution, it just takes time before people get used to it and accept it.
Cosmo P, trust me on this, because I’ve been to IFAB meetings. Six votes are needed to make a law change. That does, indeed, mean the four Brits need two of the others to vote with them, but Blatter doesn’t control those other four. More importantly, if Blatter proposes something and gets all four FIFA reps to support it, he can’t get It through without two of the ‘home’ FAs to support the idea too.
This historic anomaly, left over from when we wrote The Laws, is one of the reasons most of FIFA hates us, and it’s one of the reasons we should NOT have a GB football team in the Olympics, because Blatter and the rest of the world want to regard GB as one entity so as to end our IFAB dominance.
Michael D (18), I hope you’re right! But respect for referees in rugby has not been enhanced by technology. They had it already.
It is possible, I concede, that if Prem refs are ceding decisions to a TV ref, then the Sunday morning nutters will accept that their ref, with no help, is just a guy doing his best. But that’s what he is at the mo, and the consensus of consent is fast disappearing.
Mick(20) – hmm. this IFAB sounds like a recipe for intransigence to me. I see they’ve just lobbed a spanner in the desire of the Dutch FA to trial video technology. The hand of Blatter is everywhere.
I’d like to think that greater use of technology would boost respect for referees. It would take some pressure off them, and, like in cricket, it would help to eliminate ‘the clanger’ – that obvious, disastrous mistake which alters the result of games. Then the ability or otherwise of the ref would no longer be the talking point, the football would. Wouldn’t that be a great thing?
I’d also like to see far more cards dished out for offences such as dissent and use of foul or abusive language. If players are allowed to get away with things they will. The referee shouldn’t allow himself to become the focus of everyone’s anger anyway, but if big decisions are cleared up by video there’ll be less anger going around.