The quality of the refereeing this season has been absolutely shit. Overall this season there have been so many errors and poor decisions. I understand that being a referee isn't an easy job but so far this season they're taking the piss. Starting with the incident involving Robin Van Persie last night at the Nou Camp. How on earth can the ref make the decision that he has kicked the ball away, 1 second after he blew his whistle, he clearly hadn't heard it. By the letter of the law he has to go but common sense should prevail, anyone could see that he hadn't heard it and didn't deliberately kick the ball away. UEFA have decided to charge Arsene Wenger and Samir Nasri for their comments after the game, but they had every right to make those comments. When footballing bodies and referees can't accept when they're wrong then this situation is going to get worse and worse.
Looking at the Chelsea V Manchester United the other week, why was David Luiz not sent off for body checking Rooney and it was totally deliberate. He knew exactly what he was doing and wasn't penalised for it. He then scored Chelsea's equaliser when he shouldn't have been on the pitch. Alex Ferguson was rightly angered by this and is also being charged for his comments about the refereeing during that match. Once again a footballing body not accepting when they're officials are wrong, this isn't helped by the fact that officials can't apologise for their decisions after the game. What are the FA trying to achieve by including this stupid rule. However Rooney shouldn't have been playing for the elbow that he gave to a Wigan player the match before, so I suppose 2 bad decisions cancelled each other out.
Now to last weekend and the Fulham penalty decision given by a certain Mark Clattenburg. A Senior Official. He gave the decision for a push in the box which once again by the letter of the law is correct but common sense dictates that enforcing this rule would mean that there are 7 or 8 penalties every match. It is this season that UEFA have launched they're Respect campaign, but to be honest I find it hard to respect an 'official' who makes a stupid decision that can cost teams points. They ask why referees get abused, is it any wonder looking at the atrocious decisions they seem to be giving every match.
So that was my rant at ref's and I hope that the decisions improve before the end of the season. But until the footballing bodies allow managers and players to express their views and decide to accept when an official makes a mistake I can't see it changing.
