Referees in the media (week 38)

‘Referees in the media’ will be published at the beginning of the week on the Dutch Referee Blog and provides remarkable or interesting quotes and links to articles worth reading.

As I sat and reflected on it all at the closing ceremony, I thought about how honoured I was to part of such an event and there was a small tear in my eye as they extinguished the Paralympic flame.

Ross Haswell has been appointed for the Paralympics final match. He wrote two articles about experiences at the events in London.

“Select group match officials are emailed on a Monday every week with the upcoming appointments. Only then can they confirm, or all to often, postpone social arrangements with wives and friends. Yes, referees have social lives, too.”

Graham Poll about referees being normal persons with social lives too. In his weekly column on Daily Mail’s website.

“Less than 24 hours to go to my game. Today was rest day and I got a haircut and a clean shave to make myself look good for the game. The assessor will be on the lookout for even the finest of details that make/break a referee’s game. The change is also nice for the confidence.”

Schiedsrichter Zeitung, the German referee magazine. Issue 5 of 2012.

“The pressure was already huge. One can as referee not rest because of your experience, you always need to prove yourself in every game.”

Knut Kircher about the match between Borussia Dortmund and Bayern Munich during last season, in German referee magazine Schiedsrichter Zeitung (Referee Newspaper, ed.). The German referee was named the best referee of the last season.

“That it went so well after my comeback last season, pleases me very much.”

Christine Baitinger is back in German women’s top league after she paused a year afther the birth of her son. He was immediately after comeback named as Women’s referee of the year in Germany.

Here’s the link to the latest German referee magazine Schiedsrichter Zeitung (pdf).

Referees in the media (week 19)

‘Referees in the media’ will be published at the beginning of the week on the Dutch Referee Blog and provides remarkable or interesting quotes and links to articles worth reading.

“If you had bad luck, the players first needed to remove shit from the field, because the cows were walking there the day before.”

Herman Efftink from Dutch town Delden tells about the first years of is long career. He has been honoured by the Dutch FA for being a match official for 50 (!) years. Newspaper Tubantia didn’t mention if he will continue his career after more than 3.500 matches half a century.

Als je pech had moesten de spelers eerst de stront van het veld halen omdat de koeien er de dag ervoor nog liepen.”

“We have huge problems by finding new referees. Next season in region Bayern we have for the first time not enough referees in the lowest leagues.”

Wolfgang Stark, referee of the Europa League final, sees that the number of referees in German is decreasing.

“Not everybody here speaks English and the challenge of communicating with the other officials and players can at times be interesting but most of the time you get your message across.”

Referee Ross Haswell about refereeing in a different country where not everybody speaks English. ‘He is in Ukraine as a member of the CPISRA football committee and to referee at the classification competition ahead of the London 2012 Paralympics’, explains the Scottish FA Referee Development Blog.

“A talent doesn’t mean that you have achieved something,” he added. “It means we think that you have the possibility to achieve something. You must turn the potential that you have into the real thing.”

David Elleray, UEFA Referees’ Committee member, during training session with talented referees. They altogether discussed incidents and team tactics of the Europa League final.

“I have been instructed by Uefa not to talk.”

Portugese Pedro Proenca wouldn’t comment on the fact that Antena 1 named in as referee for the Champions League final.