Basically speaking with Phil Hodgson of League Express
It is coming to something when the referees and the administrators of the league fight.
This, however, is what appears to have happened with the Huddersfield Referees’ Society and the Yorkshire Junior League, although I can’t be entirely sure, as no one really talks about it.
They’re tweeting, though, or at least they were at the end of things for the referees. Huddersfield referees released a statement last week on Twitter saying they will not send anyone under the age of 18 to referee Yorkshire Junior League matches. Why? Well, in a nutshell, one of their younger members fired a manager in a recent Under 10 game – and the club is far from happy with the punishment inflicted on that manager by the YJL, which as far as I can collect nothing more than instructions for completing a positive coaching course.
The company believes it’s not hard enough, and judging by its Twitter feed, it has had enough of the YJL’s promises to improve behavior in too many clubs, be it players, coaches, administrators or parents.
So the Huddersfield referees and the YJL are in a stalemate (as far as I can see, neither of them seem to want to talk to the media).
Whatever the precise details of the impasse, Rugby Football League is working hard to resolve the situation, both in detail and in the broader aspect.
There is concern in Rugby League – and, indeed, in all sports – that match official abuse is getting worse. RFL’s director of participation and development, Marc Lovering, says it has gotten worse from the Covid-19 blockades – and it’s hard to credit, even though the initial opinion was that people were frustrated after kicking their heels for. over a year.
In my opinion it is time for there to be a real crackdown on referee abuse. I’ve written the same thing quite often over the years, and perhaps too much leniency (at the club and league level) has allowed a cancer to grow and, potentially fatally, take root.
I remember a conversation a few years ago with a very important figure in a major league who said he didn’t think players should be sent off or suspended for swearing in on referees. I couldn’t believe what I was listening to and didn’t strongly disagree, but he kept insisting. His league, to be fair, didn’t share his point of view – not judging by the penalties imposed on the wrong players, anyway – but his stance showed a mindset.
My approach, at the club level, was to tell the players that they would be completely on their own if they ever found themselves on the carpet for dissent. The fact that a referee had (perhaps) made a mistake had nothing to do with it. And they found, on the relatively rare occasions they were on the carpet, that I wasn’t just saying it. They were really alone.
The position should be simply simple. All match officials, as part of the Rugby League family, should receive a warm welcome from both teams to any match and show due respect (which, in all honesty, should be returned, but it is).
Everyone should be able to chew fat in a civilized way after the game, bearing in mind that every single person involved in a game (players, referee, coaches and, yes, administrators) made mistakes that day. The mantra that I have always proposed is that the only person who is never wrong is the person who never does anything, which if you think about it is true. And we should all keep in mind that whether you think a referee made a wrong decision often depends on the team you are involved with.
Lovering and his colleagues are facilitating a meeting at the end of the season. He can’t come soon enough.
And while the Huddersfield Society’s approach might be seen as almost bordering on petulant in that they’ve been happy to tweet but don’t explain further, I can see where they come from if I turn the matter around. It has been a few years since, in a Serie A match involving my club’s second team, I received more and more complaints from our players who were making some shots that would normally have been penalized and that the referee was by name their opponents. I got to the point where I asked our coach-player if what our boys were telling me was true, in which case I should have informed the referee that if he didn’t offer protection to our players I would have to protect them myself by taking them out of the game. field.
Luckily we didn’t come to that, but we weren’t far, perhaps the Huddersfield Referees Society thinks they are in a similar position.
One reality in all of this is that a lot of annoyance can be avoided if a referee possesses that almost indefinable quality – man handling.
One of the best I’ve ever met is Tony Martin, from Oldham, who you can really talk to, and who has often been given the “hardest” amateur level games by the nominating officers.
Tony’s name appeared in a story sent to me by my old friend Roger Halstead, who was a Rugby League correspondent for the Oldham Evening Chronicle for many years, about a meeting held by Fitton Hill.
Fitton Hill’s big moment of glory came when they won the highly prestigious Oldham ARL’s Standard Cup, which in the 1980s drew many thousands of people to its Good Friday final at Watersheddings. And who was a key figure in that triumph? None other than Tony Martin, whose transformation to a final try ensured a point victory in a match in which he had already scored a penalty and a field goal. He has also been described as a player who never took a step back.
It never occurred to me that Tony had played the game. Maybe typically like, he never mentioned it. Come to think of it, though, that’s no surprise. He is a true referee of players, with an understanding and empathy that can only be strengthened by having been a player himself. It’s not absolutely essential (many excellent whistles come to mind who have never led the ball or made a tackle) but I think it helps. Tony, who was unable to get to the meeting because he was taking a charity bike ride (typical of the dude, again) believes his happiest days in the Rugby League were when he was playing for Fitton Hill, which is saying something. But many people (myself included) know exactly what he means.
And I bet most of the players who take part in the women’s finals next Sunday in Headingley will say, when they are old, more or less the same thing. The Leeds Rhinos face St Helens in the Grand Final, while the Featherstone Rovers face the Huddersfield Giants at noon in the Plate final. Do not lose. And, for those players, don’t miss the new Women’s Amateur Rugby League season, which kicks off later this month with around sixteen teams.
Finally, the regular Friday statement from the RFL to clubs came to me on Saturday (for some reason I no longer receive it directly). The thorny issue of player dues is still on the agenda and the issue of charging players who join a club on the day of a match, thus ensuring that a match can go on, is addressed in the next two. weeks. Another big obstacle to get around, I think, and I hope it can be solved.
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