What a beautiful weekend. Weather was great on Saturday for my start of the regular season. In the morning I worked a U12 boys match that was not particularly interesting except two nuggets. They happened one right after another. To lay the scenario down, it was one of the local teams versus a team that was heavily latino. In my past experience, the heavy latino presence tends to favor that team as they play more of a control/individual style as opposed to the boom and run that most anglo teams like to play. In this match, it did not work out for that team. It was perhaps that they did not have enough players (9 suited with 8 on the field) as well as U12 being 35 minute halves instead of 30. So they basically ran out of gas after going up 1-0 early in the match.
In the second half with the match pretty much decided for the other team (they were up 3-1 and pounding heavily for more), I call a free kick close to the top left corner of the penalty box. On the run up to the kick, the defending team's wall, instead of holding their position, run up to try to block the kick. One boy moved up a foot or so, but the other had charged about 5 yards of the 10 he had. I stopped the play, carded the player and then I hear the other boy tell his now carded teammate, "No te preocupes, el es un maricón". I grew up around Spanish speaking parents and grandparents enough to know what that means (something akin to "The ref is gay"). So I looked up, and proceed to tell him in spanish that I knew what he meant and he'd better not say it again. He turned pale to say the least.
In the end, I should have gone over to the coach and explained what happened, I should have carded the boy as well but well, I guess I got flustered. I certainly think he will think twice before uttering such an opinion.
So the nugget is more for the players, but for us, it is how we deal with it. I could have (should have?) carded the player, but the mere fact that he was so surprised might be enough for him to not do it again. I will not ref them again this season, but perhaps we cross paths again. If we do, I wonder what will happen...
