Words from the Weekend

It was U-14 and U-12's again this weekend ... but I was assigned one U-8 Girls game! I usually get assigned one of these U-Little games when they want me to train another ref. This time I was hooked up with Blake. Blake played for me way back in the day and now has grown (physically and emotionally) and become a pretty good referee.

We started out just cracking up as we were checking in the teams. There is always one little girls on a U-8 team who is a chatterbox and thinks any conversation is directed toward her. I started by saying, "Hello, Ladies, my name is Mr. Allen and this is Mr. Magda. We will be your referees today." No sooner were these words out of my mouth than one of the girls supposed it was an invitation to talk. She starts jabbering away about having seen us referee her older sister's game and that we did a good job. She was just getting to the good part when the coach quietly said, "Janice, let the referee's finish their job." She brightly said, "Okay" and gave us the royal nod of her head to proceed. Only in U-8's!!!!!

Also ran into a contrite coach this weekend. He only fielded nine players at the start of the match (the others didn't arrive until well into the game) and you could tell that with a full complement of players this team would have been competitive. He was trying to urge his team on for most of the game. When their opponents passed for the fourth breakaway in a row, he yelled out at the AR "[Expletive deleted] Get in position and call the offside!"

When then play went out of touch, I jogged over and met the coach at mid-field. He was already hanging his head and apologizing. He noted he was way out of line, but I still booked him. The problem was that I think he was exactly right! The AR on that side has a history of not concentrating and getting behind the play. I noted that for the rest of this match and the next one, he had superior concentration. When we debriefed after the game, he tried to put the blame on the coach. I didn't let that get excuse even see the light of day. I'm hoping he's taking these corrections to heart.