Scotland’s referees might be sponsored by Specsavers these days, but that doesn’t stop Hugh Dallas reciting a line from the famous old BT adverts. The SFA’s head of referee development insisted last night he would be happy to sit down more frequently with managers and players and speak about the way the game is being refereed in this country.
The 2009-10 campaign has been a controversial one so far for officialdom, with no fewer than 29 red cards handed out, in addition to high-profile breakdowns in communication with Motherwell manager Jim Gannon and Aberdeen director-of-football Willie Miller.
“You can never knock sitting round a table and talking,” said Dallas. “If people think there is a need to sit down and talk then lets sit down and talk. We had a meeting of the managers at the start of the season which went down really well and although we are aware that things have not been perfect, we will work away in the background with our referees and analyse incidents in matches and how they have handled things. We will praise them when required and we will also tell them that we can do better in certain other areas.”
Dallas will convene a meeting of all the top referees early in the new year to discuss certain “topical issues” which have arisen in the first half of the season, but denies there is any crisis in relations between the match officials and the other stakeholders of Scottish football. He refutes the suggestion that there has been any instruction given out to referees “asking them to clamp down on any particular aspect of the game”.
Only a day ago, he had a 20-minute conversation with one Premier League manager who was “very balanced and constructive” with his comments. Another SPL manager had sent him a club DVD of an incident which would now be used to illustrated the point to his flock of officials. His door is always open.
“I think there is a good working relationship between myself and the managers, but you know things can always be improved on both sides,” said Dallas. “Why would there be a crisis this season when there wasn’t one in the last 10 years? There is a good relationship there with the majority of the managers and we want to make sure that becomes unanimous.”
This good to talk stuff does have its limits, however. Dallas is in full agreement with the decision taken two seasons ago that the SFA’s whistleblower website should be scrapped as it was not operating in the best interests of the referee, and feels the general purposes committee is generally in the right when it administers sanctions against managers and players who go overboard in their criticism of a particular match official. Continual criticism of a referee, be it from players, managers or indeed media outlets, affects the confidence of a match official just as it would anyone else. And it hardly helps their attempts to sell the prospect of refereeing as a profession to the younger generation.
“I don’t have a problem with a manager saying, ‘at the end of the day the referee had a poor game today’,” said Dallas. “I don’t think that is a problem. It is when it goes further than that, and they start issuing marks out of 10, saying they thought the referee was ‘appalling’, or didn’t do that and didn’t do this. I think it goes too far then. Certainly, the referees respect the players and the coaches and what they are trying to do. All we are asking is that it is reciprocal.
“We can’t all end up criticising each other,” he added. “I think we need to try to concentrate on the positives and try to find solutions to our problems. If we have any refereeing issues – and I am the first to admit that we maybe do at the moment – then that is the job of myself to try to look at these things and help referees through that. If a manager has got something to say, contact me. If a player or the players’ union has, then contact me, and lets sit around the table. But lets not air our dirty laundry through the newspapers.”
It is, after all, the players who are on target to beat their 2008-09 record of 54 red cards. Dallas is keen to ensure the referees are not hung out to dry for it.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article