Safety on the field is referee's main responsibility

I must admit to being shocked when I saw the Stamford Bridge pitch on the televised highlights of the game between Chelsea and Charlton Athletic It resembled a large rectangular sandy beach with not a blade of grass to be seen Now we hear that Charlton who lost 4.1, have complained about being made to play on such a surface and have demanded a replay. 

ome may feel that the referee should never have allowed the game to be played. However, the match was completed without any real difficulty and, what is more important, without any injury that could be ascribed to the surface. This showed that, as far as the referee's responsibility was concerned, his decision was correct.

When a referee inspects a pitch before a match he has two main
responsibilities. The first one is to check that the field of play is marked out in accordance with the Laws and competition rules. The second and more important responsibility, however, is to satisfy himself that the pitch is safe for the player, to play on. Reading fans I'm sure will remember that the recent game against Leicester was abandoned 'for the safety of the players' in the words of the referee.

Of course you won't always get agreement. Both managers at the
Madejski that day later said they didn't agree with the referee but the decision is his alone. Disagreement can be the other way of course. I remember years ago refereeing Swindon Town's A team against a country side. The field of play was covered in an inch or two of snow but it was soft underneath and in my opinion didn't present a danger to the players. The lines had been swept and painted blue (It's a fallacy to think football field markings have to be white). 

Swindon didn't want to play. Their management tried to blackmail me by saying that it could ruin the career of any of their young professionals if they slipped and broke their leg and they would hold me responsible. The game was played without any injuries. The Swindon players who I think were told by their management to be
ultra-cautious were walloped by the country side who just played as normal

It is often thought that a frozen pitch poses the greatest risk to players but it isn't necessarily so. There was a report in the Evening Post recently where a referee sensibly delayed kick off at a local ground which has suffered a severe frost. The teams were delighted saying that, although the ground was hard, it was no harder than pitches they played on at the end of the season. Something I've
often pointed out. 

What makes frozen pitches dangerous is if they are slippery
and players are unable to keep their feet, or if there are frozen ruts. These could cause players to trip and, if they went down, could gash their arms or legs Where there is a doubt about the fitness of a pitch many referees test it out They run up and down with a pair of boots and a ball to give themselves some idea what it would be like for the players. You may have seen a referee doing just that on television recently before he decided to call his game off. 

One other thing that many referees, even in local games, are doing where a game is doubtful, is to check the weather forecast. These don't come only from the Met Office, there are many companies giving local forecasts for the price of a telephone call. If the referee of the Reading/Leicester match had known there was going to be the downpour that happened for most of the first half he probably wouldn't have even started the game. That would have given the
managers something else to complain about.

Dick Sawdon Smith

© R Sawdon Smith 2003

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