Referees love football. Period. I heared some people say that referees are on the pitch to get an ego boost of being in a position to take important decisions. That’s not my case and I think I could speak for most of us referees.

Football is a wonderful sport and refereeing is nice way to be part of it. Forget what former German football player Lothar Matthaus said about refereeing. In his opinion refereeing “has nothing to do with football”.

The FA in England advertises for more referees with the question: “Love football but can’t play as much as you did?“. They want people who love the sport and that what it is refereeing all about. Or check out what Adrian Skeete, a Fifa referee from Barbados, once said on my blog: “Football and sports – and my wife of course – have always been my love of my life.”

I love it when players show their skills, make nice double passes and score wonderful goals. Last weekend I refereed a match and one of the players scored from about 40 metres with a shot in the right top corner of the goal. Just wonderful.

The man who took pictures and video’s didn’t expect it either. He started the video a bit too late, so you could only see the goal scorer’s feet. Check it out below:

Please comment: What makes refereeing beautiful for you? Why did you start refereeing?