At the end of November we ran our annual Continuation Training Seminar, aimed at referees who have taken up the whistle during the last couple of seasons. It is one thing to pass a referee's examination but something quite different to actually go out there and referee. We invite those attending to bring along any difficulties and problems they have encountered at their games. The agenda is set by them and we try to share experiences.
Those of us conducting the seminar, do what we can to draw on our knowledge to help them tackle these situations with renewed confidence, particularly when they realise they are not alone. Some of these difficulties are very similar year after year. Two that stick out are dealing with club assistants, those who volunteer or who are volunteered to run the line for the clubs and, for those referees who are taking youth games,
parents.
Let me first of all say, that visiting youth games on a Sunday, either as part of our practical training for trainee referees or mentoring new referees, I know that there are a great number of devoted people, many of them parents, who do an enormous amount of good work to ensure that young people, boys and girls, can play competitive football. But also standing on the line, I do hear an awful lot of aggravation from parents at some football matches.
All supporters are biased of course but parents can take it to the extreme. It is after all their little Johnny (or Jenny) out there and they can't resist voicing their opinions about everything, including the referee's decisions. The fact that most of them have little understanding of the laws, doesn't deter them. Nor does the fact that the referee is probably a youngster
him/herself. It's strange isn't it, that parents with children of their own, can take it out on someone else's child.
I often feel sorry for the coaches too. They are trying to get the youngsters to play as a team and every parent is shouting telling his/her offspring what to do.
Jim de Rennes, who is an instructors' instructor for the FA lives in Surrey but is a fan of this column and he sent me a newspaper cutting recently. The article was reproduced in the Telegraph
but originally appeared in the New York Times.
We often think of America as a soccer desert but in fact youth football is huge. In the article it talks about Weston, a suburb of Fort Lauderdale in Florida, where they have two and a half thousand soccer-playing children. On Saturdays their 16 fields have games taking place for 12 hours.
They have exactly the same trouble as we do at our matches. Vocal parents. But in Weston they have done something about it. They have 'Silent Saturdays'. I know when I was in the States last year, this was being talked about. It is copied apparently from Holland where they have been doing it for some time.
Silent Saturday is the name given to the day on which coaches in youth football are not allowed to coach out loud. Parents are asked not to cheer or guide their children. There is no shouting, no yelling, no threatening or cat calling and no arguing with opposition parents.
The idea is that without all the noise coming from the touchlines, there is no pressure on the children. They are then free to have fun. I know everyone likes to win but to me, football should be first and foremost about enjoyment.
I wonder if any youth league in the country would be bold enough to ban shouting from the touchlines for one day a month. The kids would enjoy it I'm sure and I know our young referees would welcome it with open arms.