Our Prayers Could be Answered

[TopSix]

Terry Christie used to manage Alloa. Wait til you see his jacket - it's braw.

[Govan Jaggie]

I was thinking the duffle coat might slow him down!

[CaleyD]

Got my Christies mixed up for a moment and thought we might get a chorus of Amarillo resonating around the stadium on Saturday!!!

[Govan Jaggie]

aturday November 27

Celtic v Inverness CT - Terry Christie

Hamilton Accies v St Mirren - Frank Coulston

Hibernian v St Johnstone - Alan Dick

Kilmarnock v Aberdeen - Andy Ritchie

Sunday November 28

Dundee United v Rangers - Kevin Collins

(Live on ESPN, 12 noon)

Motherwell v Hearts - John Connolly

(Live on Sky Sports, 2.15pm)

Has anyone heard of any off these refs? I have never seen any off them ref ICT. Looks like it is sub refs for Saturday. It is taken from the SPL website.

I am a dozy fecker. Having looked deeper, these are the SFA numpties that are their to make sure the refs do their jobs properly! I think I need someone like that next to me at the PC!

[TopSix]

So if the SFA have made appointments for this game, can we assume it'll go ahead?

[Scotty]

Celtic v Inverness CT - Terry Christie

I am a dozy fecker. Having looked deeper, these are the SFA numpties that are their to make sure the refs do their jobs properly! I think I need someone like that next to me at the PC!

No worries !!! I am sure the idea of seeing Terry Christie running up and down the field at Celtic Park wearing his duffle coat gave us all a chuckle

[BornCaley]

does this action involve those would be SFL refs, Assistants, 4th Officials?

[Johnboy]

does this action involve those would be SFL refs, Assistants, 4th Officials?

Yes. They're all members of the Ref's Association.

[Johnboy]

Stuart Regan (of the SFA) has announced that refs will be brought in from other associations in the UK, and is hoping that most SPL games, and the Alba Cup final will go ahead.

Here's hoping a ref from the Northern Ireland FA will be taking the Celtic-ICT game!

[robbylad]

I'm probably going to get some abuse for this but hey ho, I'll just go on strike.

Referees get paid (anyone know how much for a top flight ref?) to do a job.If they do that job well they get promoted up to European, world cup games. If they do that job badly (Dougie) then they will get slated. They will get called all sorts of things, they will have their parentage questioned and even possibly get the odd hollow death threat. As far as I'm concerned, if that is as far as it goes so what, it's part of the job and at the end of the day sticks and stones etc. Try going to Afghanistan and doing your job badly, it won't be sticks and stones coming at you and you won't be able to go on strike either.

I think that too many people in this day and age are too quick to start moaning and complaining about the way thay are treated. In the old days if a ref got some abuse off a player, manager, fan he would have given as good as he got. Unfortunately there are too many spoilt brats in the game (on all sides of the whistle) that can't take it.

All this strike will do is alienate refs even more because it will inconvenience so many people that have booked trains, planes, buses, hotels etc.

Man up and get on with it.

PS: If the player, manager etc does go a bit over the top (Celtic) Then the SFA should be man enough to do something about it.

While you are absolutely right about our service men and women and what must be unbelievable pressure, football shouldn't be compared to a war zone. It's a sport for goodness sake and there must be something far wrong with society when referees and their families can be terrorised in their own homes. For what? Having the audacity to make a mistake that some paranoid a*****le sees as part of a hidden agenda. The clowns at parkhead should hang their heads in shame. All they are doing is helping the morons feel justified in their paranoia. I wish they would all grow up.

Shankly was wrong.... football is not more important than live and death.

Oz , i take my hat off to you sir . Perhaps you could round up some of these morons and teach them what really is important in life and it sure as **** ain't football.

[dougal]

One word to describe the action taken by these so called Top Refs ---- PATHETIC!!!!

?800 + a game and as soon as they get a bit of criticism they throw the toys out of the prams

Dougie MacDonald should have been fired or at best downgraded to officiate lower league games for his part in the shambles

Celtic should be hauled into the SFA offices and severely fined or get points deducted for their part

As Scotland is a very small country refs should be made to declare what team they support before they get the badge, although we all know the majority will say Rangers

The standard of refereeing in this country is at an all time low and i would fully welcome refs from other countries officiating as it will highlight how bad our numpties really are

dougal

[ICTPaisley]

Dougie MacDonald should have been fired or at best downgraded to officiate lower league games for his part in the shambles

He did get the penalty decision correct by changing his mind.

[Johnboy]

He did get the penalty decision correct by changing his mind.

Yes, but then he lied to the manager of Celtic Football Club, and a more heinous crime than that is unimaginable.

[CaleyD]

The only problem with taking in "outside" Refs is that they will be asked/expected to operate under the exact same conditions as our own Refs, and as those conditions and operating procedures are as much a part of the overall problem as anything else then the only benefit you get is that games go ahead.

If games do go ahead with these other Refs then all we'll get is lines like "They don't know how the game is played up here", "They're from the wrong part of England/Ireland/Wales" or any one of another 101 inward looking excuses where people refuse to take responsibility for their part.

[+DoofersDad]

We need the SFA to pay a foreign ref handsomely to make all the important decisions against Celtic at the weekend. That way Celtic might appreciate that Scottish refs actually do a pretty good job.

Of course, that would give a big advantage to whoever Celtic are playing at the weekend.

Who are they playing at the weekend, by the way?

Oh! It's us!

Well I never!

[Bridge_Ender]

The ref's are completely justified in their action. They aren't throwing the toys out the pram at the first hint of criticism, if that were the case they'd have given up 150 years ago! I think referees expect, and accept, criticism but that does not mean they should be subjected to some of the insanity that players, managers and fans feel is justified because football is an 'emotional game'. When that abuse continues after the game and follows the Referee home and affects his family and work life,it's gone far too far.

Celtic are the catalyst for this episode but all the clubs have to shoulder blame as every club has had players and managers booked/sent off/sent to the stand for dissent. However, the SFA have allowed it to continue unchecked for far too long. Maybe it's because there is a new Chief Executive who doesn't understand the ridiculous politics that consume the Scottish game, or maybe the organisation is just weak. Reid and Lennon should both be charged with bringing the game into disrepute and Dougie MacDonald shouldn't be allowed to officiate at a kids kickabout again. It doesn't matter whether he ultimately got the decision right or wrong. He lied and as a Referee his integrity cannot be in question so his actions have made his position untenable.

The whole situation is just an embarrassment for Scottish Football.

[TopSix]

Erm, I wouldn't like my family receiving death threats or having windows smashed for refereeing a game. Don't blame them at all. A ref from a different country would be interesting. Wonder when the SFA will clarify when this game is going to be on. Need to think about train tickets.

[Johnboy]

The ref's are completely justified in their action. They aren't throwing the toys out the pram at the first hint of criticism, if that were the case they'd have given up 150 years ago! I think referees expect, and accept, criticism but that does not mean they should be subjected to some of the insanity that players, managers and fans feel is justified because football is an 'emotional game'. When that abuse continues after the game and follows the Referee home and affects his family and work life,it's gone far too far.

Celtic are the catalyst for this episode but all the clubs have to shoulder blame as every club has had players and managers booked/sent off/sent to the stand for dissent. However, the SFA have allowed it to continue unchecked for far too long. Maybe it's because there is a new Chief Executive who doesn't understand the ridiculous politics that consume the Scottish game, or maybe the organisation is just weak. Reid and Lennon should both be charged with bringing the game into disrepute and Dougie MacDonald shouldn't be allowed to officiate at a kids kickabout again. It doesn't matter whether he ultimately got the decision right or wrong. He lied and as a Referee his integrity cannot be in question so his actions have made his position untenable.

The whole situation is just an embarrassment for Scottish Football.

I agree with most of that Bridge Ender, but it was little more than a white lie Dougie Mcdonald told Lennon in a vain attempt to protect his assistant.

It wasn't like he was saying Iraq had weapons of mass destruction,capable of being activated in 15 minutes, that could pose a threat to our bases in Cyprus.

[Yngwie]

I have a lot of sympathy for refs but I'm slightly puzzled by this course of action, which has come rather out of the blue (or green, perhaps).

Surely the correct thing to do would be to write to the SFA demanding whatever it is they actually want to happen. And then, if no action is taken to deal with their concerns, by all means go on strike to force the issue. That's how it normally works anyway.

[big man]

The problem we have now is if dougie Macdonald does the right thing and goes it would then seem like Celtic have won the arguement and they would then feel that their stance has been justified so we are now between a rock and a hard place.

The thing I have difficulty with is that players seem to think it is ok to cheat, to attempt to get opponents sent off if Mr Reid is so righteous he should start with the players sort them out make the game better to watch and easier to referee.

[Oz647]

I'm probably going to get some abuse for this but hey ho, I'll just go on strike.

Referees get paid (anyone know how much for a top flight ref?) to do a job.If they do that job well they get promoted up to European, world cup games. If they do that job badly (Dougie) then they will get slated. They will get called all sorts of things, they will have their parentage questioned and even possibly get the odd hollow death threat. As far as I'm concerned, if that is as far as it goes so what, it's part of the job and at the end of the day sticks and stones etc. Try going to Afghanistan and doing your job badly, it won't be sticks and stones coming at you and you won't be able to go on strike either.

I think that too many people in this day and age are too quick to start moaning and complaining about the way thay are treated. In the old days if a ref got some abuse off a player, manager, fan he would have given as good as he got. Unfortunately there are too many spoilt brats in the game (on all sides of the whistle) that can't take it.

All this strike will do is alienate refs even more because it will inconvenience so many people that have booked trains, planes, buses, hotels etc.

Man up and get on with it.

PS: If the player, manager etc does go a bit over the top (Celtic) Then the SFA should be man enough to do something about it.

While you are absolutely right about our service men and women and what must be unbelievable pressure, football shouldn't be compared to a war zone. It's a sport for goodness sake and there must be something far wrong with society when referees and their families can be terrorised in their own homes. For what? Having the audacity to make a mistake that some paranoid a*****le sees as part of a hidden agenda. The clowns at parkhead should hang their heads in shame. All they are doing is helping the morons feel justified in their paranoia. I wish they would all grow up.

Shankly was wrong.... football is not more important than live and death.

Oz , i take my hat off to you sir . Perhaps you could round up some of these morons and teach them what really is important in life and it sure as **** ain't football.

Robbylad,

Sorry if I came across wrong in the way I wrote my rant. I'm not comparing Football with a war zone merely pointing out that there are more high pressure jobs than reffing. It seems that people are all too quick in striking when something happens that they don't like.

If we all did that the world would come to a stand still. Now don't get me wrong, the refs shouldn't be subjected to the **** they are and the morons that are guilty of the abuse should be taken care of by the FA or if need be the police. Having said that I've stood on the streets of Belfast and had people question my parentage, thrown rocks and petrol bombs at me and eventually been shot at. Unfortunately I couldn't go on strike and no I'm not looking for sympathy. You just get on with it. I think the problem is the mentallity of today, the compo culture. The way we think that if someone upsets you, you should be due something in return.

On the flip side, if someone is found to be breaking the rules/law then they should be dealt with. Unfortunately because of the softly softly culture that has been adapted in Britain, nothing will happen because if it did the scroats would complain about their human rights being restricted.

I have to stop now, I'm building up to going out and smacking some poor innocent person just for the hell of it.

Edited November 22, 2010 by Oz647

[Scotty]

The problem we have now is if dougie Macdonald does the right thing and goes it would then seem like Celtic have won the arguement and they would then feel that their stance has been justified so we are now between a rock and a hard place.

Tend to agree with that..... but there is more than enough blame to be spread around in this complete cluster****

Dougie McDonald actually got the decision right so I am not sure what the hell he was thinking in lying to Lennon. I see no issue with the referee conferring with his assistant ... thats why we call them assistants now and not just linesmen !!! The problem is that for some reason he chose to lie about the discussion and that reduces his credibility to zero. I would even go as far as to say it brings the game into disrepute as both managers deserve the right to have controversial decisions explained to them and referees have, for too long, denied them that right. Saying nothing - or maybe telling the truth - would have been a better course of action in this instance.

Lennon and Reid are also bang out of order. It is nothing short of bullying and their actions put pressure on every single official now and in the future. Lennon seems to have been having a right go at refs from the start of the season and for the Chairman to comment on it at the Club's AGM is also ridiculous. I would say that they too are guilty of bringing the game into disrepute.

The associations - be it referees or SFA - also have a part to play. The refs association should have dealt with McDonald and should not have allowed Craven to be hung out to dry. for Craven to make allegations of bullying and harassment from within his own organisation is troublesome in the extreme. The SFA/SPL are also guilty of inaction in that they could have warned, fined or otherwise dealt with officials of their own member clubs who were crossing the line and taking the abuse to another level.

All in all its a 'perfect storm' of ineptitude, lack of integrity, and bully bhoy tactics that has led us here.

So how to get out of it ???

Refs have to be more open. I even experienced it in my amateur days, where refs would hide behind their 'it will all be in my report' statement, and as they were still empowered to include stuff after the game, even a polite request for information could sometimes elicit an after match booking for a player or official !!! That is wrong. Refs should be allowed to explain decisions to managers after a game, and managers should be allowed to ask about them. If it is done civilly then there is no issue and there should be no threat of disciplinary action unless it is warranted.

Referee reports cannot be deemed to be 'gospel' anymore. The game could be live on TV and the sky could be blue and the weather sunny and thousands of people might have been able to testify to that, but if the ref said in his report that it was snowing, the SFA would take that as fact over everything else. Again, I have seen it in amateur football where we had to give the referees report a 100% weighting over any other evidence to the contrary. That is wrong. It is what it is and if the refs report is wrong, and provably so, it should be disregarded.

The SFA/SFL/SPL have to come up with a code of conduct for club officials ... and quickly. I do not think officials should be gagged but by the same token they should not be allowed to go off on one like Reid/Lennon. There is a happy medium somewhere where officials should be able to say there were decisions they didnt agree with but that they would be discussed through the proper channels .... with the proper channels perhaps being an independent group made up of refs, officials, players, ex-players so all views could be covered .... It would not change anything for any individual match, but perhaps by actually discussing it rather than shouting from opposite poles there might be some common ground and common sense to be found and lessons learned for future matches.

and finally ... maybe it is time to look at modern day technology ??? I dont want to see the game stopped for long periods any more than anyone else but perhaps there is something less intrusive to the game that could be employed? Would a '5th' official dedicated to watching the game on a monitor and the ability to instantly rewind and view controversial decisions be a compromise? I can do it on my own TV in half a second so there would not be much if any delay and if refs have earpieces it would be easy enough for the 5th man to say 'inside the box', 'outside the box', 'gimme a sec, looks like a penalty', 'so and so elbowed this one off the ball' etc etc etc. As all incidents would be recorded, decisions could later be shown to be correct !

PS - the malaise is not confined just to Scotland. MLS refs are bad too ... and in Toronto there is a huge screen at one end of the ground showing every piece of the action live .... the refs are instructed NOT to look at it after blowing the whistle. I guess they are not allowed to change their decisions based on seeing what actually happened either ... just got to go with their own decisions !

[CaleyD]

Technology is what's causing much of the problems we are witnessing...i.e. Television...so not sold on the idea of throwing more into the mix.

For a start, where do you draw the line?......

Goal decisions? Penalty decisions? Foul decisions? Touchline decisions? Offside decisions? Handball decisions? Off the ball incidents? Watching the dugout? Distance from ball on freekicks?

No matter how much technology you introduce, someone will always claim it's not enough and want more. Why bother with Refs on the pitch at all, sit them in little rooms where they can remain totally anonymous to players and public....heck they wouldn't even have to be in the stadium.

Granted, I've taken that all to the extreme but I think people are kidding themselves if they think technology is the answer and we need to be very very careful about opening the floodgates on technology and making the game sterile.

What's more, there's little enough money in the game as it is (unless you're a player). How do we pay for the technology and at what level and/or for what tournaments do you insist on it's use? Yes, TV cameras are at many games these days, but can it be relied upon? And, is it any more justifiable to use it in the SPL to prevent a bad decision that might see a team relegated than it is to use it in the 1st to prevent a bad decision that could cost a team promotion? Same principle applies to cup matches.

It could very well be the case that TV has already opened the floodgates on technology and/or created a situation where it's the only way to bring the game back into order. It's already killed crowds and created a situation whereby kids would rather follow a team hundreds, if not thousands, of miles away on a box in their homes as opposed to getting behind the local team and attending games.

TV (especially live tv) has done NOTHING to improve football....quite the opposite, and the more technology we introduce the more soulless and sterile the sport will become.

Sadly, the people involved with and running the game don't have the gumption to being about the changes that are needed and nothing will happen until it is forced upon them...or it's too late. We're kidding ourselves if we think the Ref strike will change or improve anything, all it's going to do is cost more to bring Refs in from elsewhere and the clubs are ultimately the ones who will pay for that.

It really is time to rip the whole thing up, get rid of the "jobs for the boys" mentality that is rife throughout the sport, and start again with people, systems and procedures that are fit for purpose. I'd rather spend the next 5 to 10 years rebuilding for the good than witnessing the game slide any further into the sh*tter.

[super1ct]

I think technology would help refs but as Caley D states its how to limit its use. My solution to this is use tennis' idea. The captain, and only the captain, of the team is allowed to ask for video replays. Each team gets three uses of the video technology. If the decision is wrong it does not count as a use. This way captains wouldnt moan about calls just to get in ref's faces and at the end of the game managers know they had the chance to check the decision. Okay it doesnt solve the problem of where to stop the game but hey thats me idea ...

[PullMyFinger]

I think technology would help refs but as Caley D states its how to limit its use. My solution to this is use tennis' idea. The captain, and only the captain, of the team is allowed to ask for video replays. Each team gets three uses of the video technology. If the decision is wrong it does not count as a use. This way captains wouldnt moan about calls just to get in ref's faces and at the end of the game managers know they had the chance to check the decision. Okay it doesnt solve the problem of where to stop the game but hey thats me idea ...

I like that, but who judges the replay? Only three uses? Lennon wouldn't last 5 minutes on that.