- Referee remuneration, career prospects, ethics.
Agreed. Pay must be commensurate to standards and expectations. The key aspect to this, though, is that the pay increase must come with clearer standards and expectations from a legitimately higher authority than the referees themselves. Fail to meet standards, fail to get PL games. Simple as that.
- Referee visibility
I don't really agree with this. The identity of the refereeing team should be transparent and readily available information, especially if point 1 is adopted. This is a key part of accountability. With the increased pay, however, I do think its reasonable to put strict rules on referees themselves in terms of what they are allowed to do and say in public, what kinds of media appearances they're allowed to make, etc. Breaching those terms for fame (or infamy) should constitute grounds for termination.
- Refereeing selection
Many good points here. Bias is fine, actually. The idea that it doesn't exist is absurd, so my solution would be to simply have more referees, and to assign referees based on self-reported biases.
- Conflict reporting & resolution
Generally agreed. However, managers yell at refs because refs respond to being yelled at, are incompetent, and are corrupt and deserve to be treated as such. Mitigate these problems in the refereeing pool, and you then have the ethical standing to start cracking down on manager and player behavior. It's not an aporia - refereeing improvements must come first.
Self-reporting biases should be normalized and de-stigmatized at every level of referee recruitment and training. Refs should probably not be refereeing games involving their childhood clubs, whether or not they feel they can be objective. Have more refs, pay them more, and select from the pool based on performance and known biases. This protects everyone, including refs.
- Governance reform
PGMOL must be disbanded. Referees should probably be governed by the FA as a final decision-making authority.
I think we also need to get rid of the subjective clock. Time-wasting shouldn't even be possible.
Perhaps more radically, I believe we need to add a referee. The lone schoolmaster/cop model is just not a good one. Running the diagonal seems so ridiculously old-fashioned at this point. Put a ref in each half, let them have a quick chat for big decisions, let them choose whether to go to a monitor as well as VAR recommendation, play what they see on the big screen, and give the 4th official a mic to explain decisions. Allow referees to consult with each other in general, and have them explain any yellow, red, or penalty decision. The fact that fans often only learn what a card is for after the match is over is ridiculous.
VAR must be entirely reformed, and be considered an different skill set. Game-day refs should be in the VAR room as consultants only, while the VAR should be specially trained for that purpose. They should advise on literally every single decision when requested, no weird rules. If a corner is contentious, they should just say who kicked the fucking ball out.
Furthermore, the Guidance Handbook should only be used to create more measurable and clear interpretations of the Laws of the Game, and never provide additional discretion or ambiguity. Furthermore, I see no reason why clubs should be subject to interpretations they don't agree with. Any new "guidance" should be ratified by representatives of the clubs in some way.
The biggest problem is fundamentally cultural. You could implement all or none of these changes, but there still needs to be a new, visionary plan that is well-implemented to radically transform refereeing at every level of the game. This includes recruitment and training. We need new understandings of what referees actually do. I very strongly disagree with the idea that referees are there to "manage" games. This is not only archaic, but an essentially impossible task. Referees are there to call the game for maximum fairness and safety, not to play the psychologist or the schoolmaster. They should make and explain decisions according to the laws of the game + any clarifying interpretations agreed upon by the league they are working in. The qualities that should be ingrained through training and awarded through promotion should be consistency, accuracy, speed, comprehensive understanding of the laws, and maintaining the respect of players and coaches - maybe even fans! These are the people they serve, because these are the people who are the game. If referees can hold a high standard (they must) then they can begin to expect such a standard from others, and deliver harsh sanctions on those who do not meet them (i.e., when Arteta goes ballistic at the fourth official, or Klopp tries to eat a linesman's head).
