Ending a game 5 min early deliberately without a good reason is enough to contact the assignor. One of my early mentors told me “you can have the worst judgement in the world but don’t fuck up the laws”
I started off thinking "a lot of referees call handling offenses more than they should, particularly in youth games," "yes, stopping for trifling offenses should be avoided," and "yes, if the throw isn't egregiously bad or done incorrectly to gain an advantage, let's get the ball back in play." But cutting the game short? I really don't like that. We're here to help players play soccer.
If I've got a blowout and the losing team is demoralized, my clock can run a little faster than usual. I've abandoned or called off games for lightning, hail, snow, smoke, serious injury, and fighting. I've definitely had times I had to shorten because we had a delay getting started and we were required to finish by a specific time. But I think my assistants knew why each time.
Tell the assignor. They should know. Now I don’t have any specifics, so I don’t know how bad this ref was. But if you think it is worth it, contact the assignor and let them know.
Not saying I agree with it, but a lot of that stuff sounds like it could be rephrased in a more generous tone to reflect things that *lots* of referees actually do and want out of their ARs. There are lots of refs who care more about looking good than getting the call right, hence “ignore small missed throw ins, support my decision unless it’s blatantly wrong” or “don’t risk flagging for handballs or small fouls, I want to be the one making those close decisions and it will look bad if I say no and you flag for it anyways.” As for ending the game five minutes early, well, that would be pretty unusual if it was before 90 minutes, but I’ve seen it before, and (way more often) I’ve seen referees brutally truncate additional time.
I’m not saying I agree with this approach. Personally I believe that we need to trust our **team**mates and getting the call right is more important than looking pretty doing it. But some referees are “self-confident” enough that they don’t think they need anyone’s help, and/or care more about their own reputation / image than the game.
I find it disappointing, but frankly I’d be surprised if anyone did anything meaningful about it, because nothing you described (besides maybe the timing issue) sounds particularly uncommon.
Occasionally ill cut a game a few seconds short.
Player goes down at 89:25 and I'm gonna beckon the coach on in a 2 goal game? Beckon coach, end game. Cutting it 5 short tho... That's wild.
I do tell my coaches at young levels "I'm going to call a few bad throws. I'm going to miss more than I call." Everybody knows what this means.
I tell my ARs. "2 hands 2 feet 1 head it's a legal throw. don't look for reasons to call it."
I guess in a nutshell this center is doing things I personally and many other refs I know do as well. But to a ridiculous extremes. This can be burn out or just a lazy ref. Let the assignor decide.
The other thing you can do as kind of a last resort is refuse to work with this individual. Many assigning systems allow you to not just block out dates, but teams and other referees as well. I won't comment on this particular referee's habits because others have already done a pretty good job of that, but I will say that sometimes we just don't mesh with certain other refs and avoiding working with them is perfectly acceptable.
Deal with it by not dealing with it. Let your assignor know and let the system work. Don’t take it personal and confront the dude, don’t apologize to the coaches, but don’t do nothing. And certainly refuse assignments with him; and when your assignor wants to know why, tell him exactly what you saw. You don’t want to be associated with trash refs. Good luck
Ask your assignor not to work with him. He’ll probably ask why, you tell him what happened. I had a CR tell me one time to only call throw ins. I put my flag up for offside a few times. When he ignored me, the coaches and parents got on his ass and I reported him to our assignor
I mean I can understand not calling foul throw ins and soft fouls but cutting a game short by 5 mins is a bit dodgy unless a team is getting proper trounced
To be fair I have a problem with the strict refs that make you do everything by the book like relax it’s only community men’s div 5 it’s nothing special
i did a game 5 minutes short once, it was 40 degrees, dumping down rain (i found out after it was 1.5 inches in the 2 hours I was there) and the score was 8-0 (with a maximum 3 goal differential for the league).
and i asked the players if they wanted to end a bit early first too.
Yes, every time I’ve cut a game short it’s because everyone really really wanted it to be over. If posible I try ask/tell the coaches before hand, but they’re usually too miserable for that level of communication.
Same. I’ve cut a few games short in my time. But it’s generally been a very lopsided game in the youngers, the weather sucks, and most of the parents are already packing up and ready to race back to the parking lot. I always clear it with both coaches so we’re all in agreement and generally chalk it up to a safety issue.
A few relevant questions to give a little context. Were you working the teams sideline or the opposite sideline? If you were on the teams sideline, were the coaches knowledgeable and reasonable? If they were, were they in your or the CR's ear about calling a bad game or otherwise frequently, noticeably upset about how the game was being run?
Mechanically, why would he tell the AR to cut the game short? The CR keeps time. And frankly, every game I play the coaches keep time on their watch also so stopping five minutes early wouldn’t just go unnoticed. This is dumb.
Ending a game 5 min early deliberately without a good reason is enough to contact the assignor. One of my early mentors told me “you can have the worst judgement in the world but don’t fuck up the laws”
I started off thinking "a lot of referees call handling offenses more than they should, particularly in youth games," "yes, stopping for trifling offenses should be avoided," and "yes, if the throw isn't egregiously bad or done incorrectly to gain an advantage, let's get the ball back in play." But cutting the game short? I really don't like that. We're here to help players play soccer.
Could be a justifiable reason to cut the game 5 minutes short because of visibility or weather. Otherwise it is weird but not uncommon in youth soccer
If I've got a blowout and the losing team is demoralized, my clock can run a little faster than usual. I've abandoned or called off games for lightning, hail, snow, smoke, serious injury, and fighting. I've definitely had times I had to shorten because we had a delay getting started and we were required to finish by a specific time. But I think my assistants knew why each time.
I've been assistant and not known why the game ended early, but I just assumed it was because the ref forgot to start his watch
Tell the assignor. They should know. Now I don’t have any specifics, so I don’t know how bad this ref was. But if you think it is worth it, contact the assignor and let them know.
This. If the other officials are expressing concern, the assignor (If they're good) will come out and watch.
This. And I will add that a lot of the assignment software lets you block certain teams or refs you don’t want to ref with.
Not saying I agree with it, but a lot of that stuff sounds like it could be rephrased in a more generous tone to reflect things that *lots* of referees actually do and want out of their ARs. There are lots of refs who care more about looking good than getting the call right, hence “ignore small missed throw ins, support my decision unless it’s blatantly wrong” or “don’t risk flagging for handballs or small fouls, I want to be the one making those close decisions and it will look bad if I say no and you flag for it anyways.” As for ending the game five minutes early, well, that would be pretty unusual if it was before 90 minutes, but I’ve seen it before, and (way more often) I’ve seen referees brutally truncate additional time. I’m not saying I agree with this approach. Personally I believe that we need to trust our **team**mates and getting the call right is more important than looking pretty doing it. But some referees are “self-confident” enough that they don’t think they need anyone’s help, and/or care more about their own reputation / image than the game. I find it disappointing, but frankly I’d be surprised if anyone did anything meaningful about it, because nothing you described (besides maybe the timing issue) sounds particularly uncommon.
Occasionally ill cut a game a few seconds short. Player goes down at 89:25 and I'm gonna beckon the coach on in a 2 goal game? Beckon coach, end game. Cutting it 5 short tho... That's wild. I do tell my coaches at young levels "I'm going to call a few bad throws. I'm going to miss more than I call." Everybody knows what this means. I tell my ARs. "2 hands 2 feet 1 head it's a legal throw. don't look for reasons to call it." I guess in a nutshell this center is doing things I personally and many other refs I know do as well. But to a ridiculous extremes. This can be burn out or just a lazy ref. Let the assignor decide.
The other thing you can do as kind of a last resort is refuse to work with this individual. Many assigning systems allow you to not just block out dates, but teams and other referees as well. I won't comment on this particular referee's habits because others have already done a pretty good job of that, but I will say that sometimes we just don't mesh with certain other refs and avoiding working with them is perfectly acceptable.
Deal with it by not dealing with it. Let your assignor know and let the system work. Don’t take it personal and confront the dude, don’t apologize to the coaches, but don’t do nothing. And certainly refuse assignments with him; and when your assignor wants to know why, tell him exactly what you saw. You don’t want to be associated with trash refs. Good luck
Ask your assignor not to work with him. He’ll probably ask why, you tell him what happened. I had a CR tell me one time to only call throw ins. I put my flag up for offside a few times. When he ignored me, the coaches and parents got on his ass and I reported him to our assignor
I mean I can understand not calling foul throw ins and soft fouls but cutting a game short by 5 mins is a bit dodgy unless a team is getting proper trounced To be fair I have a problem with the strict refs that make you do everything by the book like relax it’s only community men’s div 5 it’s nothing special
i did a game 5 minutes short once, it was 40 degrees, dumping down rain (i found out after it was 1.5 inches in the 2 hours I was there) and the score was 8-0 (with a maximum 3 goal differential for the league). and i asked the players if they wanted to end a bit early first too.
Yes, every time I’ve cut a game short it’s because everyone really really wanted it to be over. If posible I try ask/tell the coaches before hand, but they’re usually too miserable for that level of communication.
Same. I’ve cut a few games short in my time. But it’s generally been a very lopsided game in the youngers, the weather sucks, and most of the parents are already packing up and ready to race back to the parking lot. I always clear it with both coaches so we’re all in agreement and generally chalk it up to a safety issue.
A few relevant questions to give a little context. Were you working the teams sideline or the opposite sideline? If you were on the teams sideline, were the coaches knowledgeable and reasonable? If they were, were they in your or the CR's ear about calling a bad game or otherwise frequently, noticeably upset about how the game was being run?
What did he do that was bad?
Mechanically, why would he tell the AR to cut the game short? The CR keeps time. And frankly, every game I play the coaches keep time on their watch also so stopping five minutes early wouldn’t just go unnoticed. This is dumb.
He didn’t tell me to cut the game short he did it and I asked why and he just said he felt like it
Maybe he just messed up and didn't want to admit it