The match that changed everything

As you know, I have said many times that I love doing matches with my daughter (and when my son was doing matches, with him as well). I thought it was a great bonding experience, we had fun and gave us something to do, together, that was akin to what some other people say they feel when they volunteer or do good, etc.

So to have a match that in my eyes ended my daughter's career or desire to referee is something I don't look fondly too. I have always tried to shield her since she wasn't as committed as my son was when he was doing it. And I am not sure if she is using the excuse to say that the match in question caused her to not want to ref anymore rather than just say that she lost the desire a while back. That is something that I am not sure she would admit to.

Anyway, the match in question, and I have to be careful of how I word it because I don't want it to be easily identifiable for the center in question since there is a lot of fallout from this match apparently.

We were not at home, but rather at a tournament elsewhere, where we were put up in a hotel, so we had a bunch of matches on Saturday and the last one was where both my daughter and I were together as ARs for a center that we both knew up in Northern VA.

Anyway, it was a bad situation, we had an issue before kick off that set the tone for a really rough match and at the end the center had to abandon the game due to threats from the sideline. My daughter says that this match, the fact that she felt we had to run for our lives (and we didn't, but it sorta felt that way at the moment) and the complete disaster that it was has given her pause and wants to not recertify.

I hold that center substantially responsible for the fact that my daughter does not want to ref anymore. She did work the Sunday matches with me and I thought she had a good time, but it seems that it wasn't enough to sway her back to reffing. I suspect she didn't really want to ref anymore and found this match as a gift as the excuse to say she didn't but the truth is that this center that I held in such high regard made a series of mistakes and let's just say, I would have handled things differently.

On the bright side, I have a lot more equipment and gear to work with now. And thankfully I had not bought my daughter the new ref shirts since we can use them until the end of 2018.

Hiatus

Boy did I take a hiatus these past 3 months. I always had it in my head that I have to post about this or that and sure enough, life would get in the way (or more games) and as they say, the rest is history. So I apologize for not getting into some of the things I wanted to talk about. At this point, the commentary about being a site coordinator is a mere figment of my memory. I do recall there being an issue with a coach who had been ejected and me having to play interference between the ejected coach and the crew that ejected him. It was nothing too terrible, but it did escalate a bit because they had to call me out to the field and make sure that the crew was able to walk off the field without the coach coming to talk to them since there was nothing that could be said at the moment.

I also will touch on a game I did in Richmond that at the moment I thought would strengthen my daughter's resolve to be a great referee but it did just the opposite. This will be in my next post because I am still quite saddened by it, by the fact that my daughter will not recertify for next year and I hold someone I looked up to fully responsible for botching a match so badly that it lead my daughter to decide that she has had enough. So that will be next time (who knows, my next post could be in 2019 and I won't even remember that I wanted to talk about it).

But I will share something interesting that I calculated today. As I mentioned, I keep a spreadsheet of all my matches. And to this day, I have calculated that I have worked a total of 914 matches since I started in August of 2008. That is a lot of matches. It comes out to 109 matches a year. It is scary to think that I have worked that many matches since starting.

Anyway, I will try to catch up on the following topics in the next couple of weeks:

- World Cup
- The match that led to my daughter's retirement
- My latest recent class

Hope everyone has a great holiday season if I don't get to posting before 2018 starts!

New Stuff

So I promised the follow up story on what my daughter did during the tournament weekend and I also have to discuss how the following weekend, I ended up being a Site Coordinator for a tournament instead of reffing games. Quite a different point of view for sure.

Anyway, first things first. The following day, during my center (I had 2 ARs and one Center), we were doing a U13 match between two teams that were clearly disliking each other. They both were from the same club and it turned out that one was an academy team while the other was not. It even started out during the coin flip when the other AR asked the girls if they knew each other and one of the girls replied, "We're XYZ academy trained and they are not."

There was a difference in style for sure but the game was 0-0 through most of the first half. Towards the end of the first half, the academy team gets a free kick close to the 18 and the resulting free kick goes in for a goal. But it was a close match for sure, with a slight edge to the academy team.

For the second half, the game continues and towards the end of the game while still 1-0, there is a play where the non-academy team is shielding the ball and there is a little shove from the defender. I am in decent position as it is in my quadrant but I also look over to AR1 since he is also somewhat close and he gives me no indication that there is anything more than trifling. About 5 seconds later, everyone starts yelling "Look at your AR". I look over and my daughter has her flag up.

Ok, I am thinking I missed an offside call. So I stop play and run over to her. She let's me know that she was calling the push in the back. And I look at her in disbelief. She was confident and I really didn't want to hurt her assertiveness so I call the foul.

The coach from the academy team says "You are going to have to explain that one to me after the game." And I thought, he is kind of right. I was about 10 yards from the play and didn't think much of it. My AR that was 20 yards away didn't do anything to indicate he thought it was a foul. But yet, my daughter from 55-60 yards away thought to raise her flag (for what I can say is probably the first time ever she decides to call a foul).

And I looked at the situation as well. To me it was low risk. The foul was a good 30 yards away from goal, no chance they can score from there directly, right? So I called it, heard the complaints from the coach and wouldn't you know it, the resulting free kick seemed to weave in between the heads and bodies of at least 6 people before kissing the far post and going in. I couldn't believe it.

Now I had a game that had to have a winner, tied 1-1 and with a goal that probably shouldn't have been called because I basically took a calculated risk that the free kick was not going to go in and it sure did.

In the end, the academy team won it in PKs and it was a great teaching moment for my daughter. I told her that we didn't communicate properly on that play. I should have looked over at her as well and she would have given me a nod or something not as obvious as a flag to indicate she wanted a foul. But truth be told, I should have said that she was there to assist and not insist. But again, I do want her feeling comfortable calling fouls, so I cannot really say that the first time she brings up her flag. It was just a bet that I took and lost. A learning and teaching moment for all involved.

I will comment on the Site Coordinator aspect of soccer in my next post. I am out of juice for today.

Getting all teary eyed

There comes a moment in time when, as a parent, you make a realization about your kids. It hits you like a brick on the head. It comes to you and you are so proud, or so amazed or whatever realization happens, it is a rush of emotions. This weekend was like that.

As you know, my daughter has kept the reffing flame going for the next generation. This weekend, we were doing a U14 game that was high level. I am AR1 and in the center, a 6. The play was the ball was rolling towards the keeper and the defender decides to play the keeper the ball ever so faintly to "hurry up" the ball going to the keeper. If there had been a touch, it was faint. The center didn't blow his whistle, though from my angle, it sort of looked like the defender had passed it back slightly to the keeper. When he didn't call it immediately, the coach on my side started talking to his assistant and wondering if that was a passback. At that moment, my daughter's flag shoots up, gives the waggle and direction to indicate that she had seen the passback and wanted it called.

I swear that at that moment, it hit me. She was a "referee". She was interpreting the laws, she saw the play, she gave the center the time to make the call himself and then when she saw that he was not going to make it, she made it for him. At halftime, he stated that he thought there was a touch, but was not sure and was relieved to see her flag go up.

As a father, it was a proud moment for sure. For those of you that are parents, you have these moments where feelings come rushing in when you realize the milestone you have just witnessed. Here was one that I was thrilled to be a part of.

Now the following day, my daughter perhaps got a little too confident. I will tell you about that in the next post.

Resetting offside

Had an interesting call to make in an Open Cup game I did about 10 days ago. It was a highly competitive match where yellow was up 1-0 when the play happened.

Blue is pushing for the equalizer, about 12 minutes before the end of the game. Player heading towards goal, about 10 yards away from the top of the 18, threads a chest high pass to a streaking attacker, ball takes a slight deflection off of the chicken wing arm of a defender and to the attacker who scores. As I am about to validate the tying goal, I see my AR with his flag up for offside.

Tough one here, because you have the offside happening after the deflection, so I had to think, was the deflection really deflection as in "no intention whatsoever" or deflection as in making himself bigger or intentionally played.

The three scenarios here are this:

1. If it is just an innocent deflection, no reset of the offside, so no goal and indirect free kick coming out.
2. If it is a "making yourself bigger" but not intentionally playing the ball, then it is handling but no advantage as offside still would count as it was a deflection in terms of intentionally playing the ball but not for resetting offside. So free kick for the attacking team.
3. Intentionally playing the ball interpretation would mean wave down the AR and say that it is a valid goal as the intentionally played handling would reset the offside, no offside, good goal.

It took me a minute by myself to figure all this out, then I went to the AR and we discussed and decided on #2. What I need to determine from those that know more than I do, is whether #2 is even an option here to select. It was a match critical choice, and I almost wish I was being assessed, because I would have loved an answer to this question on the spot.

Still, when I do get a chance to pose this question to someone who knows more, I will post their reply. Until then, let me know what you think would be the correct interpretation. Thanks!

Stats on that Mental Picture

I am going to attach some of the stats that the Garmin device lets me see instead of the running map. It was 90 degrees at kick off and it was certainly a somewhat humid day, so I am sure I burned a lot of calories. But impressive was the amount of info that the Garmin device collects. I am sure others collect similar info, so perhaps it is time to look for one of these now that the cost is down to around $100.

Mental Picture

Let me describe the mental picture that I took the other day at one of my games. It was last week and I had the center of a WPSL match in the area. I am running down the field, slightly to the left and behind an attacker trying to close the gap and score a goal that would put her team back into contention. In front of her was two defenders and then in the background, the scoreboard. It read the score and the time was 87:19. At that moment, after running over 5 miles in the center, on a sweltering day in early July, it hit me.

I made it to where I wanted to be. It was the perfect snapshot. High level match, 75-100 people in the stands, a 4th official on the sidelines, announcers, an international walk out before the game and I was the center for all of that. It was a great feeling.

Did I have the perfect game, no. Not at all. I caught a lot of flak from the home team for a handling call when they had the game in hand that lead to a PK and my lead AR said that she wouldn't have called it. There were other little things that I could have done better. But at that moment, at 87:19, it was perfect.

And we were wearing the new powder blue uniforms that I doubt I will wear often, so that was a plus. Anyway, had a lot of fun and thought that it was a great snapshot. Too bad I could only capture the moment visually and not in a more permanent way as it would be great to frame it for posterity.

Great local article in the Washington Post

The Washington Post had a great article regarding the decrease of referees in soccer and other sports and what is causing the issue. The conclusion is that most of it can be attributed to abuse from parents, coaches, etc.

The full article can be found here:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/sports/highschools/verbal-abuse-from-parents-coaches-is-causing-a-referee-shortage-in-youth-and-high-school-sports/2017/06/16/cf02a016-499a-11e7-a186-60c031eab644_story.html?utm_term=.4f107205c738

It is something that I had said was one of my reasons for ceasing to referee high school, it was the loss of decorum and the hypocritical aspect of high school that stated that the soccer field (or any other sports' field for that matter) was an extension of the classroom.

Anyway, it was good to see the Post having a say, being accurate and measured in the piece and also it was great to read some names of people that I admire being referenced in the article. Take a look and hopefully in your area things are a bit better.

Assessment

The assessor rated it difficult and I thought I had failed. There was so much talk and in the end, I was not aware of all the back and forth that the two teams had for each other.

It started at the end of my partner's assessment which was the first of the two matches. The center for the first assessment match, where I was an AR had a relative benign match until the very end when he had to card the goalkeeper of the team hanging on to a 2-1 lead for holding the ball well beyond the 6 seconds. After that match, the goalkeeper that would turn out to be the main antagonist says that our yellow card was not correct because the goalkeeper was moving. To which I replied, "Try that in my match and see how quickly you get a yellow card." Yeah, it didn't get any better.

I later found out (a couple of days later) that this goalkeeper is always running his mouth and is well known in the league. Another reason to do more games, to be exposed to, and be able to deal with, those complicated players that seem to try and feast on a referee that they don't know.

Anyway, the game went well for a while until the second half when one team tried to make up the difference as they were down 3-1. They scored to get within a goal and from then on, it was a show. The team that was leading started complaining about everything, diving and going in hard. Being an assessment match, I tried to handle things without cards initially. Bad mistake.

The most interesting interaction was at about the 80th minute, the team down 3-2 has one of their big guys go into a challenge for the ball right in front of the assessor on the other side of the benches. I was right there and didn't see much in terms of the challenge. He comes out yelling that the opponent kicked him and tried to throw a punch. The assessor was right in front of it all and yells out, "Cut it out, he did none of that." My guess is that he was trying to help me by giving me info that he had since it happened right in front of him. Since the two players scuffled before I got there, I ended up giving a yellow to both but told the one claiming murder to tone it down as no one saw anything.

In the end, there was more, and I frankly thought I had failed. I felt like it was one of my worst games ever. But the assessor said it was truly a difficult match and while I had not passed with flying colors, I had passed. I thank the assessor for the assist. As I said in the previous post, either I have to learn to like the adult game and not fear it, or I can just go back to being an 8 or 7 and doing the games I like.

Assessment Match stats

I will write about my assessment match from hell tomorrow most probably. I don't have the time or the mental state to write about how much I loathe working some of these leagues, but I did come to the conclusion that I will try and double down on these matches to see if I can eventually remove myself of the hatred I currently have for the adult game. If by the end of 2017 or early 2018, I still despise them as much as I do now, I will just go back to being a 7 or an 8 and do games that I like to do at the older youth level and leave it at that. Why do it if you don't like it? But I am giving myself a chance to get used to doing adult matches that are competitive and that pose a challenge.

Anyway, two takeaways to quickly point out. First is that I passed the assessment, even though I thought it was a failure for sure. Second, I ran 5 miles in between the first and second half. I like the Garmin, it does a good job. Here is a clip from the Garmin Connect website:

Stats for my 1st half run

There are a lot of other stats that are included, like elevation change, or fastest sprints and pace, etc. The way I use it is to set a Run, and use my Garmin as a count up timer. Then I use the other watch to count down. So the Garmin counts up as well as grabbing all the extra info and the other watch counts towards zero. So far it seems to be working. 

That is not one of your choices coach

Another one of those musings that start with "And here I thought I had seen most of everything". I am driving to a game with my daughter and wife. I was heading there right at kick off and knew that we would be short a referee. My wife and daughter were already there. The assignor tells me to be dressed and that she would let the Center know that I was on my way and that I was a parent of one of the players but that since I was the "only option she had" she was going to assign me.

On arrival, I change (into those new shirts I am not too fond of yet) and take the flag about 4 minutes after kick off. My daughter's team is attacking in my direction and in that first half I call my daughter offsides on a close play as well as declaring a no goal on a ball that ran the length of the goal line in a game where my daughter's team eventually would lose 2-1. What I am implying is that if I had wanted to favor my daughter's team, I certainly could have.

Anyway, at halftime, we go to tell the coach that I am a parent of one of the players and the coach goes ballistic. He tells the center that he had a perfectly good AR for him before I showed up and that now he does not want me on the match. I tried to explain that I had already made calls that didn't favor my daughter's team and he immediately cuts me off to say "I don't need to hear anything from you. Go to the sideline and watch the match like the parent you are."

At that point, the center official told him that it didn't quite work like that. He explained that the AR he had originally provided was not in uniform, no longer certified and was also a parent. He went on to explain that I was a State referee and all that it implies and that in the end, he cannot choose not to have me on the match as that is not his call to make.

He explained that his options were to bring his team out for the second half or not. He could not block my being an AR because I was the best option the center had. He could file a protest after the match if he wanted to but that was it.

I was really taken aback by how rude the interaction was at halftime. At the end of the match, the center explained to him that there was a liability issue as well to consider. Should the officiating crew have been sued because of what they did during the match, the AR that was not currently certified would have been part of the lawsuit and would not have been covered by the insurance that USSF offers officials. It was interesting, but in the end it all worked out, however it was testy.

Finally, as I was about to drive away, the other AR comes over and tells me that he was also a parent on our team and he just chose to not disclose that, particularly because he knew that something like what I went through at halftime might occur. To which I responded that he still should have made it known. The reffing dynamic is always interesting that is for sure.

New Watch

Ok, this one is going to be short but today for the first time, I used my new Garmin VivoActive watch to measure my distance and actually get some more info. This was a U14 Girls match and I ended up running 4.1 miles. 2.0 in the first 35 minutes and 2.1 in the second half. The interesting statistics that I can get from the Garmin device is that you not only get the distance, but you get a map of how you ran your center as well as max speed (11.9 mph) which translates to a 5.15 minute mile on the site.

Take a look at my first half diagonal. It is clear that one team was pushing more than the other as seen how deep I got for one side and not so much for the other side.

Interesting to see how much one runs and where one runs. Very excited to see these additional statistics. I had used it previously for an adult 7v7 center and a D2 Adult match. Those were 2.0 miles and 2.7 miles respectively.

Screenshot of my first half today

New Shirts

Ok, quick show of hands. Who has bought the new shirts from Official Sports? I got all 10 of them in the Pro cut over the holidays and they started trickling in. Finally a couple of weeks ago, the last one came in. I hadn't used them though and everyone said, you want to go a size down as the new ones are different and hug you more than the old ones.

This past weekend, in a story I will elaborate on later, I had to use the new yellow short sleeve because the old style was in the wash. So I finally put on my small sized shirt and boy did it HUG! I immediately realized that it hugs in the chest/belly area almost like a cyclist shirt seems to do. Wasn't really expecting that level of huggedness.

When ordering originally, I had Official Sports send me a short sleeve and long sleeve in both Small and Medium and sure enough, Small was a better fit but I better do a good job of keeping the weight off (my McDonald's lunch staring right at me right about now) or else I won't really be able to fit. Talk about an incentive!

Assessment Complete

The assessment was completed, nothing too terrible. Game was not really too complicated. One yellow card only and the takeaways are to get out of passing lanes (where have I heard that before, yeah, in other assessments) and to watch for contact above the shoulders.

That last one was the main negative that I got dinged on (as well as my lack of applying consistency with regards to handling). The episode in particular was a short player going up against a larger player for a header. The taller player swung out his arms for balance and made more than incidental contact with the shorter player's face. I didn't perceive it at the time and therefore let play continue but the shorter player evidently took a stronger blow than I thought he had taken and was down. I check on him, he continued playing and then made a reckless foul that earned him the only yellow card of the match. What the assessor told me was that  had I called the contact to the face, then probably I wouldn't have had to deal with the yellow card. And he is probably right. So passing lanes, contact above the shoulder and consistency with handling are the three areas that I need to work on.

My next assessment is in about a month and if all goes well, I will be done for 2017.

Assessment today

Virginia has asked all referees looking to stay a 6 or above or those going from 7 to 6 to be assessed their matches before June 30. That is a lot of assessments for only a half a year. Today is my first one, and I will have to find another one in the next 2 months for the adult match. Hopefully it goes well because the assessment fees are expensive!

Also wanted to share something from my son's high school match the other day. I don't know who the center was nor did I find out, but he did something that I would love to be able to use as well in the future. The game was 2-1 in favor of my son's team. Game is getting chippy and there is a lot of talk. Ball is played through to a streaking attacker for my son's team and he makes a move to go one on one with the keeper, and pushes the ball past the keeper and the keeper takes him out. Outside the box but in my view, clear DOGSO. Everyone in the stands goes crazy, tempers flair on the field. They come and tend to the injured player and the ref just pulls the keeper aside and starts talk to him. He talks for what seems like a minute or so and the tensions on and off the field calm down. Finally, he shows the player a red card but it wasn't a "I am angry at you" red, it was more of a "unfortunately I have to show you this" sort of red. And everyone was more calm by the time that happened. Had he gone in guns blazing, showing the red (which is probably something I would have done), the tension would have remained high. I felt he handled it quite well. Just something to remember for next time.

Ref dreams

Had a really interesting dream last night that I figured I would let you all know about, just because, not that it has a lot of tough decisions as a ref but more for the entertainment value of how one's dreams work.

Scenario was that it was a U littles game somewhere with a lot of trees. Not a field that I recognize. It is a final or some sort of knockout because in my dream, I know that there has to be a winner. Game starts and nothing interesting happens until somewhere early in the game, a player comes late and wants to come into the field. Somehow, the coach pulls all of his players off the field now that he has the new player and retreats to a corner of the pitch to talk strategy.

My in-dream persona cannot believe what I am seeing. It seems the parents take it all in stride because they retreat as well to talk among themselves. So I approach the coach and tell him he has to come out and play, since the game is taking place. Let's go. To which he says no, he does not have to bring his kids out. And then I distinctly remember telling the coach, "You have to bring out the kids to play, otherwise, I will yellow card each and every one of them."

Don't remember much after that other than going to the parents and telling them that the game was over because one team did not want to come out to play. Not sure what that means in terms of what is really going on in my head, but I just don't recall having many vivid ref dreams like this. I know I have replayed plays in my head while awake, but asleep like this, I don't think I have had many. For those that know about dream interpretation, let me know what you think all this means.

Subs and restarts

I know, 2 posts in two days is not something you see often. Well, consider me inspired. This post is in regards to probably what was my son's last travel match ever. Next season he will (hopefully) be playing in college and has already committed to a school in Virginia for soccer. Nostalgia aside, we had a couple of interesting points for the match. The center was a man I know and respect a lot. Love his no nonsense reffing style. Don't always agree with his calls, but he is one of those "old guard" type of referees. You know, honor and all that.

The two interesting things were that in about the 13th minute and with my son's team already down 2-0, a teammate of my son does a great move and gets his support foot swept right out from under him in the penalty area. Clearer PK would have been hard to conceive. Yet my friend makes no call. So he is conditioned for the next call and unfortunately gives my son's team two PKs after that missed PK call. I could justify one of the two, but it was tough to see him rattled after the first non-call. My guess is that he knew he owed the team a PK and ended up finding two.

And those things happen. You replay a call in your head at a stoppage, or at half and then "find" calls that kind of make up for the missed call. It would be easy to make each call an isolated event, irrespective of the previous call or the score of the match or any of the other million factors that we weigh every time we decide to blow or not to blow that whistle.

The other interesting thing, and one that I would love some feedback on, is the inability of some of us to not be able to shed some things that we learned way back when. Almost myths, even. Like my friend. After he made the PK call (the one that he actually decided to award), a sub was waiting at midfield and he let him in. Rules of the competition did not actually permit this, but he was going with any stoppage and no one decided to correct him. Then he states to my son's coach that the PK cannot be taken by the sub. And I have heard that before. In fact, many of us have used that before. I know that I have probably thought of it, but it is rare to have the scenario, so I cannot recall if my previous self has ever denied a sub a PK restart before.

But truth be told, the laws of the game don't say anything about that. If that were true, a sub really shouldn't be allowed to take a throw in either. Or a free kick, or a corner kick, or partake in a dropped ball, because all of these scenarios is where he or she is the first to touch it after coming off the bench. So, it is my understanding that this is a myth or a misconception that has been passed down from generation to generation and from referee to referee, but I have really yet to find it written down anywhere. Perhaps some day,  I will find it, but for right now, I think a PK restart is just the same as any other restart. At least that is what I believe. Let me know your input and I will post the results in the coming weeks or months. Also, don't expect another post tomorrow.

Self Incrimination

Ok, I am going to try and add something funny, timely, or nuanced about the something that happens at the games I attend or ref.

The first one is going to be about self-incrimination. It happened to me at a fairly high level match in Richmond a couple of weeks ago. The play was white attacking and black defending. White midfielder lofts a through pass to a streaking attacker towards the top of the box. Keeper comes out and from my angle, it looks like keeper is going to grab it without a problem. Attacker makes a really fast run however. Defender that was lofted over is facing her goalkeeper and looks over her shoulder and appears to get in the way of the attacker. Keeper picks up the ball and attacker and defender collide spectacularly.

At first thought, I was thinking defender was WAY too far from the ball to make a legitimate play but at the same time, she didn't shift her position that much and so it could be a foul on the attacker. I run over, make sure everyone is ok and I was going to ask my AR who has a better "playing distance" angle what he thought. The defender then did me a favor by saying "but I was just shielding, she didn't have to run me over."

My AR confirms that the ball was at least 5-6 yards away at the time of the collision and so I call a foul in favor of the attack. Had she kept her mouth shut, I wouldn't have known her true intentions, though I suspected them and probably would have had the foul coming out instead of going in, but she confirmed that it wasn't that the attacker just bowled her over, but she intentionally got in the way.

Coach was not at all happy, but such is life.

Next time, subs and PKs.

Happy New Year

Everyone, sorry I fell off the radar a bit. I have not really been inspired to write about much even though a lot has happened. I still don't have this itch that I had before, but I will try and keep writing something since there is a lot to cover. Future posts will talk about:

- New Uniforms
- Virginia's new assessment requirement
- Futsal's big push
- World Cup going to 48 countries in 2026

I will try to write up some of these in the next couple of days and post them here. Keep your thoughts coming and I will be in touch in a couple of days. And hope everyone had a great start to 2017.