QuincyAbeyie like I’ve said before. I don’t think there is some grand conspiracy. These people are human. Have you ever been pissed off or felt insulted by someone. You want to show them. You might not go out with a specific grand plan but you’ll enter the room with baggage.

I think these guys are badly trained on a lot of these things. Biases, communication etc. I just say this cos I see this in corporate environments with people who are incredibly educated and make millions. There is no grand plan - just bad impulse control and dialogue. And it leads to a lot of suboptimal outcomes.

These refs have a lot of responsibility. They need to go out onto a field with teams and fans they have histories with in high pressure environments, and make split second decisions. The animal will often win in these circumstances

Claudius

Claudius like I’ve said before. I don’t think there is some grand conspiracy. These people are human. Have you ever been pissed off or felt insulted by someone. You want to show them. You might not go out with a specific grand plan but you’ll enter the room with baggage.

That's making a wrong decision on purpose. Even though biases can't be eliminated, they know. I might support my girlfriend in a discussion because she's my girlfriend, but I'll still know that I don't actually think she's right.

If you think PGMOL actually do think there's nothing wrong with the red card and don't even realize that they let fouls that pass all the time, due to their biases, that's possibly even more alarming.

They are absolutely, 100%, without a shadow of a doubt, making incorrect decisions on purpose. They implicitly admit to it with their cowardly "clear and obvious" and "re-refereeing" rhetoric. They act like they aren't the ones who devised those ridiculous notions in the first place!

As for corruption, of course they are corrupt. They have shown a willingness to act dishonestly for personal gain. Brown paper bags are for film noir, not real life. You can't arbitrarily make up the definition of corruption.

As I've said before, the "they're only human" argument is bunk. Humans are not so pathetic as all that. Humans are fully capable of managing their biases. If these ones aren't, they're unfit for the work.

If you think they’re not corrupt then you must think a referee at this level can actually be this bad at his job. I don’t believe that. They know very well that what they’re doing is outrageous and wrong.

Refs from outside of England.
A ban on moonlighting in any other club games, friendly or not. Official internationals only.
Short contracts, 1 or 2 seasons, with a major panel review at the end of the contract.
Give VAR more teeth to overrule poor refereeing.
Pay them more to compensate for more accountability and attract the best refs from around the world.

All of the suggestions in this thread make sense. One key thing in my eyes that will not / cannot be easily reformed is the lack of serious (sports) journalism in the UK. The lack of accountability exists partly because certain members of the press keep defending their buddies in the refereeing corps and are unwilling to be critical where it counts, let alone do any serious investigation into these refs, their motivations, incentives and conflicting interests. It seems like the UK sports journalist exists to travel around the country and attend games with his mates, not to speak truth to power.

Gurgen is part of it a deference to authority? The man in the black shirt said it, and so it must be so. I find the presenters on Sky have this attitude. I’m no anarchist, but I don’t want mad decisions to go unquestioned.

Gurgen sports journos in the UK are usually folks who aren’t good enough to be news journalists. I’ll leave you to decide how low that bar is.

Gurgen It is like an old boys club, back in the day Fergie was the chairman of that club with journalists and refs happy to try and bend reality to his will.

Social media has many faults but one thing it is proving it these bullshiters are getting called out publicly and they have no place to hide. The Mirror just put out a hit piece on MLS and Arsenal Twitter hounded them into deleting it, that would not happen 20 years ago.

Triple their wages. Attract talented people.

Claudius expand it both in the pool and on the gameday. No need for this weird single-ref model.

Coombs that probably requires a bigger change from FIFA.
For now, I just want to see a fresh faced ref from the south coast. I want so many of these guys that we just call them ref. They are no longer featured stars like WWE heads and heels.

1. Professionalism and probity.

1a. Increase referees' salary to an executive level.

1b. Prohibit other forms of income, with a system of monitoring and mandatory declarations of gifts and other benefits.

1c. A complete ban on media appearances and public comment for active referees.

2. Quality.

2a. Specialisation. Establish the description of match day, VAR and lino roles, and stop pretending the same people can carry out these functions interchangeably.

2b. Standards. Establish stringent annual recertification requirements for referees, monitoring decision accuracy via high volume simulations, testing physical fitness and addressing questions of character as necessary.

2c. Consequences. Remove those officials who fail to meet the requirements twice.

2d. Development. Rotate senior, currently certified referees into a fractional training roster to train and mentor their replacements, including probationary periods under supervision for the top flight.

3. Laws and decisions.

3a. Make the VAR accountable for the outcome of handball, offside, goal line and corner decisions (and other "low discretion" decisions), and also empowered and expected to intervene overruling the match day referee as necessary.

3b. Make the match day referee accountable for cards, penalties and free kicks, including responsibility for asking for VAR support, reviewing any provided video as necessary, and unifying the on and off field evidence to inform the decision. The match day referee's decision is never "overturned" because they are responsible for correcting their own errors.

3c. A continuous independent review of all decisions made by both VARs and match day referees. Decisions deemed contentious are flagged and the number of flagged decisions is publicly advertised.

The more I think about it, just create a separate developmental pool of VAR referees. Get them from other leagues and stick them in the control room. This immediately breaks all the hierarchies, and hopefully makes VAR effective.
I think VAR is incredible but many of you guys have either implemented or being on the end of large technology interventions. If you don't focus on the people, prcesses and decision making, you're fucked

The VAR role requires markedly different skills and perhaps should be staffed independently from the on field role without any clearly "secondary" status.

The VAR could be accountable for many decisions over and above the on field referee.

At the moment the VAR system amounts to "old mate off duty" for the match day referees, and it's corrosive to the concept.

The whole going to the monitor is also BS. When they go they always overturn. So either you give this authority to VAR, to overrule, or really recommend to the ref to take a look and then he decides. In either case clear role definition is required, and complete separation between both