I have given some right stick to referees over the last few seasons,and fully justified in my opinion.
We have suffered too many times for their unacceptable performances and have lost many points due to there incompetance.
Am i the only one who thinks this season they have been better, or have our overall performances been so good that their shortcomings have gone unnoticed.?
I think it is a bit of both,we have been great, and they have not been as bad as the last few years.
We are more disciplined, and that has helped.But i think, as much as it pains me to say the quality of officials in our league has been an improvement, let hope next season it continues, but with the antics of Marriner and Webb lately i have reservations.
Obviously there has to be exceptions to the rule, and without any doubt the worst official this season was Darren Deadman at Charlton, who turned in one of the most appalling and onesided performances i have seen in many years.Interesting to see that he seems only to ref at a much lower level nowadays. I am sure NP will be greatly relieved that we shouldnt have him again.
Have refs been better this season?
posted on 24/4/14
We do seem to have had a lot of refs this season who have been intent on letting the game flow, which is generally a very good thing.
They have appeared to be better in the main, but it's hard to specify exactly why. For instance, is it the way we've played that's leant itself to more lenient refereeing or are they making improved decisions? Maybe we've adapted our style and the technicalities of tackling to the way refs are known to operate, or maybe they've had an easier time because we've been ahead to often in home games and therefore the crowd haven't been on their backs so much for the occasional wrong decision. Furthermore, maybe we just haven't cared so much about their wrong decisions because we have more faith in the team.
There are a lot of possible reasons why the referees have seemed better this year, although it seems unlikely to me that it's a simple case of vastly improved quality as that takes a lot longer to implement. I'd be interested to know whether there are any cross-league stats about referee satisfaction levels to see whether they've gone up or down overall, and not just up for the team that have finished top and love everyone right now.
posted on 24/4/14
Its not the ref its the cheating managers and their players that are the problem. Miek up the refs and watch the game change.
No manager loses a game its always the ref/linesmans fault.
Fans one eyed view if things does not help but thats all the fun of the game.
posted on 24/4/14
We've definitely had more penalties, there's been less blatant penalties to moan about and we've got away with a couple as well so that could have made a difference?
As someone else mentioned too, our discipline is a lot better, fewer bad decisions from players leads to fewer problems with refs.
posted on 25/4/14
Don't think the refs have been much better on the whole but must agree with Nev - it would be very interesting to mike up the refs - perhaps then we'd get to know why they make what seem to us sometimes as crazy decisions. Our good discipline (on the whole) has been a real factor in our case.