Question Number: 26580

Law 5 - The Referee 7/27/2012

RE: Adult

Paul Horton of Birmingham, England asks...

Can a referee be punished for consistent bad decisions or bias in a professional match, and if so what is the process for complaint, and possible repercussions. Most referees do a wonderful job but occasionally televised matches shop up the woeful performances of the few. So much rides on high level games so when a ref repeatedly gets is wrong it can affect a team or players whole season. Who referees the referee?

Answer provided by Referee Joe McHugh

Hi Paul
At the highest level every single game has a referee's observer present whose role is to assess the performance of the referee and assistants against a set performance standard. Repeated failure by the referee to reach that standard will result in demotion for the referee.
In the UK the head of the professional referee's body PGMOL is Mike Riley and that body controls and manages that process in the professional game.
Last season a number of PL referees were demoted after poor performances. At tournaments there is a referee committee whose role is to assess performances and to reward good performances with more games and to demote referees after poor showings usually by not allocating further games in the tournament. In the recent Euros an assistant referee was demoted after making a number of poor offside decision which I might add were very close calls only picked up with the use of technology.
However in general I would say that referee performances are good. From time to time referees get it wrong and that is part of the game. In the Euro Championship there was an accrucay level of 95.7% according to UEFA on offside. Now try to tell teams that were disadvantaged by the 4.3% decisions. Case in point was the Ukraine ball over the goal line incident v England. The AAR thought it did not cross the goal line and in good faith did not give it. Pierluigi Collina, former referee and now head of Refereeing in UEFA referred to it as ?a human mistake by a human being.? However the Hungarian referee team in the game did not get any further games in the tournament despite Victor Kassai the referee being tipped as a potential final referee.
So despite what people think there is a rigorous process of assessment of referees and every game is reviewed. Sometimes the decision is not possible to get right due to the position of the officials and the way the situation unfolds. The decision can only be made based on what the official see, without the use of technology.
In summary good performances are rewarded while poor performers are not.

Answer provided by Referee Dennis Wickham

Referees are reviewed in every professional match.
The public may not know the results, but there is a direct effect on the referees future matches from consistent errors.

Every referee makes a mistake. But, good referees learn from them and strive to improve.

The notion that professional referees are "biased" is IMO, junk. Fans can perceive things with their hearts, and think that three close decisions in a row that go against their team indicate bias. But the referees are the only ones who don't care who wins or loses. They make each call based on what they see, what the players will tolerate, and what the laws require.