Seasonal Review

This past soccer season has been quite a long one. I have done a wide variety of games ranging from not so exciting slow freshmen games to intense Big Ten games. There were a lot of rough frustrating games but also a number of games that went smoothly. For the 2010/2011 fall season, I have done 66 games total. All those games in about a month and a half. 66 games, for those who can't do the math, is at least 1 game every day of the week. Sunday through Saturday. My schedule for a normal day over the last couple months was, wake up at 7AM, go to work, get off at 3pm, then go drive to a school somewhere and do a game or two and get home between 7 and 9pm. After I would get home I would simply eat and then go to bed and wake up and do it all over again. During all these games, I did plenty of high school games and during almost all of these games I had to issue either a caution (yellow card) or an ejection (red card). All together I've issued 66 cards. 59 cautions 7 ejections. Hands down, I have given the more cards in this season than in all the years I've been a high school referee combined. The past 2 years I've only given about 9 cards, cautions and ejections together. About 2/3 of the cards I issued were for dissent(objecting by word or action to any decision made by the official). The other third was for stupid fouls/incidental language. The ejections ranged from foul language directed towards another player or myself to denying obvious goal scoring opportunities and retaliation/striking an opponent. I don't know what it was about this season but all these teams had players that didn't know how to not whine or complain or keep their mouths shut about something. They all tended to say something stupid which they ended up paying for. The best advice I can give to any soccer player that reads this, and I'm sure many refs would agree with me, don't argue with the referee. Even if it is a "bad" call, all you are doing is getting on his nerves and risking getting a card. The last high school game I did, I had a player come up to me after the game and tell me that I was terrible. I promptly proceeded to give him a caution. The player didn't care if he got the card because his season was over, it was the regional final for his team and his team lost. Regardless, there is no reason to do that which is why I carded him, and for the hope that when his school see's the report I wrote, will take action towards that player with a detention or some kind of punishment. 

Being a referee, especially a soccer referee is a very difficult and stressful job. Unlike other sports we do not have the ability review plays/goals. Every call, every no call, every offsides, every goal is all called or not called on the fly and once it we make our decision we cannot go back and review what happened to make the right call. One of the things that makes me laugh, and I'm not the only one, are the parents. They all think that they know every single rule of soccer. They think they know what offsides is or what a foul is (everything is a foul when they're son/daughter falls over and loses the ball), or what a handball is. According to the parents, if the hand and the ball touch at ALL, it is a handball one hundred percent no questions asked, and if it is not called then the ref is horrible and needs to go back and look at the rule book. Every game I do, I notice a lot of things when it comes to players arguing calls made by an official. All of my referee friends have noticed this as well. The pattern is very noticeable. It all starts with the parents then moves to the coaches and then finally the players. By the time it reaches the players, we, as officials, are in trouble because we have to deal with it. Not just from the players but from coaches and parents as well. There are the few exceptions, coaches don't allow they're players to say anything to the ref except good game or ask for 10 yards. I have a lot of respect for those coaches. They make my job much easier. But for all the other teams that have the players/coaches/parents that get out of hand and no one does anything to stop them, they make my job hectic. It's those games that I seriously question if I want to continue being an official. On average, soccer officials have the youngest age for referees quitting. Most referees start when they are about 13 or 14 years old and they start with the little kids doing U8 or U10 games. The parents and even coaches for these teams go yell at these young referees like they are paid for it. They verbally assault these kids and the kids end up quitting because they can't deal with the parents. I've seen this happen before. Its quite sad. The parents are being less mature than the kid refing the game. It truly is difficult being a young referee. I have experienced it first hand and still experience it to this day. Most parents and coaches don't see me as an adult. But because I look young, younger than I actually am, they think that I am just a kid and have no idea what I am doing. They think they can walk all over me and I won't do anything about it. Yes, all referees get yelled at but the fact of the matter is I get the hard end of the stick. When I get these games where parents and coaches and players yell at me I want to just quit and walk away not to look back ever. But I never do quit. I stay because of all the other young referees that look up to me. If they see me quit then why would they stay in the game? 1 Timothy 4:12 "Don't let anyone look down upon you because you are young, but set an example for the believers in speech, life, love and in faith." The verse gives me strength to keep going, not only through the hard games, but through much of my life. Which is a story for another blog.

To wrap things up, I have learned a great deal from this past season. For instance, I need to not do as many games. Yes I am young but even the young have limits and need breaks. My body needs a few days here and there to recover and so does my mind. I may be able to do the games even if my body is sore but I cannot perform to my fullest ability if my mind is not in the game because I am exhausted. I need to make time for myself where I can just do what I want and nothing else. A time where I can just be. Overall, I am happy that this soccer season is over but at the same time, I am looking forward to next season and can't wait to start.

Moody Bible Institute vs Greater Lakes

This past Saturday I worked a mens soccer game at Moody Bible Institute. I arrived to the school at about 12pm. The game didn't start until 3 but I had a 10 game at Lyons Township High School so I was already close to the city and there was no point in driving all the way home to just turn back around to the city. I waited in the athletic department building for my crew to arrive.  While I was waiting, I started talking to a couple students that both attend Moody and work in the athletic building. One of them asked me a lot of questions about being a ref and how it all worked. I asked Nicole, the girl I met that worked there, what it was like to go to Moody. How she liked it, what she didn't like and so on. I had a good conversation with her. She said that she loved the city and Moody, mostly because she grew up in the city and is use to it. Nicole was a great help (and also very pretty). Haha. At about 2:30, my crew showed up and we went out to the field. When I started to get close to midfield, I noticed something strange. Great Lakes had a Co-Ed team! Never in my 3 years as a NISOA(college) referee and 7 years as a high school referee, have I seen a Co-Ed team at this level. The keeper for Greater Lakes told me that the reason they had a Co-Ed team is because of Title IX. Greater Lakes doesn't offer a womens program. That is something that is almost unheard of. The two women on the team didnt play until 19 minutes left to play in the entire game. I think they should've have had more time to play, especially since their team lost 11-1. Greater Lakes didn't score until the final minute of the game. The whole game, even though was a blow out, was still relatively exciting. There were a few fouls here and there but nothing too major. After the game, I drove home, which took over an hour because the traffic in the city is terrible and ridiculous. Once I got home, I just laid down, grabbed a bite to eat and relaxed. It was a long day, since I had to do games all day long.

Wheaton Academy Homecoming Game 2010

Recently I was assigned to work the Wheaton Academy homecoming game against Wheaton North this past Friday, October 8. It was an excellent game. With a final score of 1-0, Wheaton Academy won their homecoming game. Originally when I received the game from my assignor, I was scheduled to be an AR(assistant referee), for those of you who don't know what an AR is, it is a linesmen. However, the person who was supposed to do the middle for the game didn't want to do it, so he had me do the middle. It was very exciting and surprisingly made me slightly nervous. I wasn't nervous about doing the game. I mean, I've been an official for about 8 years and have done hundreds of games of all different age level and skill level ranges. So the game itself would not be a problem. The thing that was making me nervous was the fact that there were at least 200 people at the game. Many of whom, I knew and/or knew me. I think most of it was the fact that a number of people who knew me were going to be watching every call I make, every move I made and then I would see the person later either at church or somewhere else.  Anyways, the game started out just as I thought it would. All the players were playing pretty spread out, passing the ball a lot and really just playing the ball. There was really nothing going on until about 20 minutes into the game. When the fouls started to happen. The fouls were pretty simple and nothing major. When there was about 15 minutes left in the first half, a WA attacker was dribbling the ball towards Norths goal and he had a North defender running right next to him trying to get the ball. When the players got into Norths goal box, the North defender, extended his arm and pushed the WA player off the ball. My AR was correctly positioned and I was positioned perfectly right behind both players running behind them to see the foul. I blew the whistle long and hard, sprinted into the box and pointed at the penalty mark calling for a PK(Penalty Kick). Norths coach did not like my call at all but I can honestly say that I would have made the same call again and that it was the right call. WA ended up scoring off the PK making the score 1-0. The rest of the half, the mood of the game changed. WA seemed to be a little antsy and North pretty anxious to score a goal and tie the game.  With about 9 minutes to go in the half, a WA player, on a dead ball situation, who was also the captain wasn't liking how I was "missing" fouls against himself and his team. I was already calling the game appropriately. I was calling the fouls both ways when I saw a foul. The WA player told me to start making the right calls. I immediately cautioned him and sent him off the field. There was only one more caution that half. It was for foul language and it was against North's player #19.

The second half started out just like it did in the first half. I didn't called a foul for the first 6 minutes which is ok. Its not great but not terrible and its expected that there would be fouls. The game continued with no major problems until about 10 minutes into the half. North took a shot on goal and the WA keeper jumped into the air to catch the ball. He got the ball but at the same time a North player ran into the WA keeper hard and knocked him down. I blew the whistle, stopped the time and cautioned the North player for a tactical foul. I called about 10 fouls for the second half. North kept up a good fight almost scored a few times. But missed.  As the game went on, the players were getting noticeably more tired. They were fouling more often and committing stupid fouls. With only a few minutes left to play in the game, #19 committed a tackling foul at midfield. I blew the whistle for the foul. #19 got up and swore. Now, if you remember earlier, #19 already got a caution in the first half for language. As soon as I heard him swear, I stopped the clock, pulled out my yellow card, and called #19 over to me. Instead of coming over to me, he walked away and said something that started with an "f" and ended with a "uck" but it wasn't Fire Truck. He directed that word towards me. Once he said that, I reached into my back pocket, grabbed my red card and carded him. Threw him out of the game. I could've given him a "soft" yellow, which would've allowed his team to put a substitute on for him but I gave him a hard red which prevented that from happening.  The game ended and WA won the game. After the game, players from both teams came up to myself and my ARs and congratulated us on a good game. But not all of the North players came up to me. One player in particular, #21, visibly came up to both of my ARs, shook their hand, and audibly told them great game. He intentionally didn't come up to me and congratulate me.  I admit, I got a little upset about the rudeness and unsporting behavior of the player but I just wrote a report about it and sent it to North and the IHSA. Normally, when a report is written, one copy automatically gets sent to the IHSA and another gets sent to the AD of the school and Principal.

Overall, I was very happy with this game. Yes, there were some difficulties but it was a very well played game. Both teams came out to play the game which was great. Bring on the higher level games!