This weekend, I worked with my daughter, who is 13 and has been reffing little this season due to her regular soccer demands. She has a big trip to Arizona in the winter and she is trying to get a couple of matches in so she has some spending money for Arizona.
So we picked up a couple of matches of the U10 rec variety. I guess I have become too used to older age groups and to travel age groups. I had an issue with one player in my match who was clearly better than everyone else but he used a lot of grabbing and pushing.
At the start of the second half, he does an elbow to the ribs of an attacker right after I called a foul. So I have a quiet word with him, no pushing, elbowing, etc. I knew that this was rec and so my foul tolerance was very low. On top of it, it was slippery because of the mud and rain. In the second half, he has a mini breakaway and dribbles the ball a little too far ahead of him. The last defender collects the ball and he slides right into him. I blow the whistle hard and do the referee based "come here", not pointing at him but with both palms to me asking him to come. I say you must be careful, it is slippery and someone can get hurt.
Two minutes later, he slides into the keeper when the keeper collected the ball. I blow the whistle hard again, and say that this is the third time we are talking and show him the yellow card. He almost started crying and then seemed to calm down. He ended up scoring three goals after that but my daughter said she was somewhat appalled at how I handled the situation. She said that the U10 player should not have received the card and that I was treating him like a travel player. I can see her point. I have been doing mostly U14 and above. And I know I take it seriously, so the rec games are more about just making sure no one gets hurt as they are not trying to win the game at all costs sometimes.
Lesson learned, I am going to try and stay away from my youth matches for a while where it involves rec and U10 or below. I would have to do a bunch of games to get back into the rec groove. Unfortunately that means I won't be reffing with my daughter as much.
