Premier League referees – The situation is now critical and needs investigated | OneFootball

Sadly, it is now time that Premier League referees are investigated.

They should be investigated not just as to whether they are competent, but also to rule out any doubts as to whether foul play has taken place in the Premier League this season, or in previous campaigns.

Either that, or today we begin the process of greater accountability for Premier League referees when making decision on key incidents.

A lot of issues arising from horrific, illogical, incompetent refereeing decisions can easily be solved by referees coming out in front of the television cameras following a game, explaining how they came to the decisions they did after a game. This would allow more time for players and managers to talk about the football, it would provide an explanation on key decisions that took place and ultimately put most matters to bed.

The main benefit being, that by putting the referee in front of the camera, it would ironically lead to less time spent talking about the referee.

Some Newcastle United readers may remember that this happened before, if you circa back to January 2004 when NUFC took on Man U at Old Trafford, we were denied one of the clearest penalties you’ll ever see in your life. Alan Shearer had nipped the ball past Tim Howard who chopped him down. Paul Durkin, the referee, turned out to be the only person in the 67,000 in attendance not to see it. No penalty given.

Quite astoundingly though, Durkin came out on Sky Sports after the game and explained that he just didn’t quite see it. Tough to take, a bitter pill to swallow, but fair enough. That’s football and that was the end of the matter at the time.

After all, without the benefit of having a TV replay, you can forgive Durkin for making a mistake. Durkin commented that if he’d had the hindsight of a TV replay, then a penalty would have been given. End of the matter. Fair enough.

Mistakes are easy to make. It has happened to me before (or quite often, if my match ratings are anything to go by apparently). I am a qualified referee and despite packing it in a short while ago, largely because of the abuse I received from one particular parent, I think the experiences (and support) referees get at the top compared to bottom of the pyramid is quite different.

I can’t relate to these guys, these Premier League referees, I can’t even work out if we are on the same planet as them, they are so incompetent. Going back to the Durkin example, I had a similar incident once late in a big game. The ball went over the top of the back line, and as the striker cut across the last defender, he took the ball past the goalkeeper and put it in the net.

My view was blocked, and I had no idea which part of the body the striker used to knock it past the goalkeeper. From the reaction of the defenders, it was almost certainly his hand, but I didn’t see it and thus everyone went mental. You can only give what you see, and sadly, there was no TV monitor for me to watch the mistake I had clearly just made.

It is those experiences that before VAR, had me feeling quite sorry for the amount of stick referees get at the top level. They are operating at the very elite level of sport (and they absolutely not elite themselves) so mistakes are always going to happen. You can always forgive an honest mistake.

However, since the introduction of VAR, my respect for referees at the top level has diminished to virtually zero. There is no accountability, no communication and in my opinion, no respect. Respect is a two-way street, as are most things in life.

In my opinion, there are two major reasons why referees at the bottom of the pyramid get so much nonsense from parents. The first is the obvious one, that parents are living out their own dreams via their kids, they lose all concept of reality and forget that this is just a kick about on a weekend.

The second is that the referees at the top are so incompetent, they bring on so much criticism, that disparaging referees becomes the norm and thus trickles down throughout the pyramid.

Referees at the top level are setting a bad example and it is having a negative impact on everyone else. Respect comes through accountability, communication, and honesty. If there is more communication and accountability at the top level, that will lead to more respect, which in turn will lead to greater respect trickling down the pyramid.

This weekend has proved that Premier League referees are not only incompetent but some people will now question their integrity (it pains me to say it). In our own game at Brentford, they were given a penalty which went against the whole principle of VAR. Not only was it probably not a penalty at all but the VAR overturned the referees decision despite it not being clear or obvious. VAR spent five minutes deciding whether a clear and obvious error took place. FIVE MINUTES. Crazy!

It is even more bizarre when you take into account previous decisions that have gone against Newcastle which were not only identical but even worse… see Fernandes on Schar last week.

No consistency. No accountability. Week after week, these nonsensical decisions are made. Why has it not been fixed yet? What is more, why is it getting worse? Newcastle haven’t been issued an apology from PGMOL yet, perhaps they have too many apologies to dish out this weekend.

Remember, these guys have TV replays to rewatch decisions, and they still get it wrong. How is this possible?

Tottenham vs Brighton this weekend was truly troublesome. You have all seen the decisions and do not need me to explain them. They are all so illogical. Particularly the two penalty decisions which went against Brighton and the ‘handball’ from Mac Allister which quite clearly didn’t hit his arm.

Those decisions would never go against a ‘bigger team’, they just wouldn’t. It would never have happened if it was a Spurs goal, nor would it happen if it was Chelsea, Man U, Liverpool etc.

That got me thinking, which referees support Arsenal, Chelsea, Liverpool, Man U, Man City and Spurs? You know, six of the most supported clubs in the country, and in the case of Man U and Liverpool, by far two of the most supported clubs in the entire world.

Well, the answer is none. None of the current crop of Premier League referees have declared that the top six clubs are their favourite teams (despite most of them hailing from the North West / London). How is that possible? There are 22 PL referees and none of them support a big six team.

I don’t think you could randomly select 22 football fans in any town /village / city in the country and not find at least two or three fans of those clubs.

It makes you think, doesn’t it?

Are referees deliberately not stating they are fans of the bigger clubs because they know it will harm their chances of maybe refereeing a big game or a cup final? Are they lying on purpose?

I even did a quick google search of former referees and could not find one Man United or Liverpool supporter. In fact, almost every referee has managed a Man United or Liverpool game at one point.

Do I honestly see a solution?

Not really.

So, what now? Investigations, suspensions, more apologies? Honestly, I think they need to scrap VAR. Sure, keep goal line technology, keep offsides (although they are even contentious at times… it is made out to be an exact science when it clearly isn’t) but get rid of VAR for everything else.

The Premier League is a commercial multi-faceted league, the best in the world, so why not hire the best referees too? Like we do with our teams, let’s keep a quota of English referees, but let’s go out and get the best referees from abroad to set the standard.

Either way, until Premier League referees start to explain the rationale behind decisions that appear to have no rational thinking, then respect will never be gained and the ultimate losers from that, are every other referee in the country.