Robo-ref is no team morale builder

Another match weekend, another case of referees getting more than their fair share of the blame in key games up and down the divisions in England.

Firstly, we go to Stamford Bridge and the case of certainly one and possibly both of Chelsea’s goals in their victory over Wigan being wrongly awarded after both looked offside (according to the press, radio and TV of course), prompting usually mild-mannered Wigan boss Roberto Martinez to label the decisions “disgusting”.

Secondly, to the Madejski Stadium yesterday afternoon where a bad-tempered game with tackles from Leeds United players flying in almost worked as gameplan enough to stop Reading but could have easily resulted in three Leeds players seeing red (the card, the mist they had already seen). Disclaimer, this blogger is a Reading fan so may be somewhat biased though the evidence of the match clearly speaks for itself. In the post-match interviews, Leeds manager Neil Warnock said that it was hard for a referee to officiate in a difficult atmosphere where Reading players constantly surrounded him.

Clearly, these are two very different cases which can each be bracketed into the four main areas of contention when it comes to modern day refereeing; insufficient quality (Chelsea-Wigan), perceived big-club bias (Chelsea-Wigan), player influence on referees (Reading-Leeds) and blaming the officials whether justly or not (both games).

Many, many words and airtime minutes will be dedicated to whether or not the decisions were right, the standards of refereeing in contemporary football and players crowding referees but I feel as if the last point is somewhat overlooked in media analysis despite it probably being heard in 2/3s of managerial quotes.

As mentioned earlier, these are two very different cases involving two very different contexts with one being a pair of offside calls and another being about red cards but the contrasts can help outline a salient point that both cases demonstrate.

Casting aside important points such as the difference in team quality between Chelsea and Wigan which affects the chances of success for either side in the match, every managerial quote that blames the officials for their own team’s failure to succeed (and success is not just winning but a draw or even a close defeat depending on the opposition) is a manager’s attempt at deflecting pressure off of their players.

“My players were not good enough/are not good enough/ did not get their jobs right on the day, therefore we lost” is rarely used when it comes to a manager’s analysis of his team’s performance for reasons such as morale and team-building. Ergo, an exterior factor is identified and fingered with the blame and the key exterior factor is the officials as they have no right of reply either in the media or on the pitch itself.

Martinez and Warnock may well have been just in blaming the officials (for my money, the former is justified in doing so thanks to television evidence, the latter is not using the same evidence showing how reckless and dangerous some of tackles by Leeds players were) but the fact is that neither of their teams were good enough to achieve their goals on the day. The difference in quality between teams, perceived bias and so on are factors but the bottom line is, their teams were not good enough.

So here’s a thought; should technology be introduced in football to ensure that decisions on issues such as offsides, red cards, the ball crossing the line and so on are correct as often as possible, what exterior factor do losing managers blame to deflect attention from their team’s failings if the official's decision would be as near as makes no difference correct 100%?

Be careful what you wish for, perhaps?