Tuesday, September 19, 2006

The car with square wheels


Now as you may well know, I used to be a ref, I did local jnr leagues round Leigh and Bolton. I mostly enjoyed it, picked up a couple of medals for officiating in cup finals (1 more than Alan Shearer) and though not perfect, I think I was decent.
As a result of this, I don't like to have a go at refs, but I think after watching a refereeing performance last night at Curzon Ashton that goes down as probably the worst I have seen in 24 years of watching football, I have to have a rant.
This pie munching clown from Wigan, wandered (I think he might have broke into a trot at one point!!) round the pitch, blowing his whistle as if he was at the Last night of the Proms, contributing to Land of Hope and Glory. Every little touch and contact brought a toot on his whistle and a stoppage of play.
I am sure if you looked at the stats, it would seem like the game was just one long foul, but it wasn't. It was a good old tough non league game with 2 committed and good teams going at it and getting stuck in.
Now I am not having a go at Young Wills red card, he can have no complaints about that, but there can be complaints at the way that he seemed to let the Curzon players , esp in the 2nd half, commit GBH and get away with it. Whilst as I say Will can't complain, the ref created that situation by his bewildering decisions and in the 2nd half, in my eyes, home team bias.
Not to mention the giving of a goal kick when the defence clearly put the ball out (and it wasn't just on one occasion,) the constant late flagging of offsides that weren't even off side, and a bit of basketball skill on the Curzon goal that Dennis Rodman would be proud of.
Is it any wonder that the 1st player over to the ref at the end of the game was the Curzon no 8, considering the ref spent the night looking after him and protecting him from the nasty roughty tufty men from Gigg Lane.
Having said all this, taking it into account along with 2 good committed teams, the weather conditions, the atomsphere in the crowd, it was a proper NWCL game and for that we should be happy with the 3 points.

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