Its great reading the posts and your experiences of refereeing. They are things that anyone learning to referee has been through. I wholeheartedly recommend doing a referees course because refereeing is one of the best sporting things I have ever done and you will look at the game from a completely different aspect after the fact. Exercising some caution, I have decided to post a one off and give some of you an insight from a referees mind-set of one specific match day I have just had and some of the things we go through in an effort to show you that some of the thoughts you have had, you are not alone.
I refereed a game at the weekend where I missed 2 key match incidents. 1 was a red card tackle and the other was an incident leading to a goal whereby the defender was taken out and I missed it. That goal cost the team the game in the end and I was advised at the end of the game of these by a referee mate watching confirming the players protests. I went to the losing coach and manager after the game and apologised profusely for missing the decision that cost the goal (having found out) and that coach said not to worry, thanked me and then praised me in the after match speech. The funny thing reading all the various NZ related football forum posts that are out there (and yes I do read the media feedback) no one has picked up on these decisions that I missed. Not one word.
Because no one else picked up on it, does that mean everything is ok? No. The hardest thing is going home and feeling absolutely rubbish about it and 4 days later, I am still angry at myself about it and it dwells on my mind when I am at work, when I am out training and when I am playing with my little boy. When you put a lot of pride in your performance, effort in preparation and as a referee, try to put as many aspects in your favour for a good performance, it just annoys the hell out of you to get those decisions wrong. We also don't forget these incidents and do our damndest to figure out what went wrong (in this case I have already done that) It also creates a bit of self-doubt because did you miss them because it was a once off? Was it a physical fitness or mental fitness issue? Was it being lazy? Was it endemic of other performances? Can you dispel those emotions before the next performance?
As much as we are 'that guy in black' we are also fathers, employees, friends, athletes and also referees. It’s a small part of what we do but it dominates such a large part of our lives and we take the role of a referee quite seriously. I think as referees, as much as we have times when we do well, and times when we don't do well, we do care and put in a lot of effort. All anyone wants after the game is 'Thank you'. That makes it all worthwhile.