Ref Watch ..... Gillingham part one

[Mick]

I never want to see his schoolboy face at a Southend match ever again. What an idiot - Barney and Macca's bookings for "fouls" were never bookings, but I suppose it allows them to sit out a potentially pointless FA Cup 1st round tie.

The free kick in the box was completely laughable - I thought he'd given a free kick to us! If anyone was watching on SSN, I just wonder whether anything was said about it? Never seen anything like it! It wasn't even a dirty game really, and yet all those bookings.

Macca's booking was perfectly justified. A niggly challenge after he had been spoken to a couple of times. The caution was for persistent infringement.

Barney's was a poor decision from a referee who couldn't be bothered to get level with the incident. Aerial challenges are very difficult (Barney gives as good as he gets and is very skilled at illegal use of his arms whilst behind his back). The only way to be sure is to get right in line and look sideways at them. As a referee, you can't do it all the time, but have to make an effort now and again to see what's going on. Certainly if you are going to caution you want to be sure. This is also where assistants can help out, particularly with their microphones and earpieces; shame they don't.

However Barney does himself no favours. Early on he was rightly penalised and we got the familiar arm waving and arguing the toss. What good does that do? It just ensures that the next two 50/50 decisions he's involved in go against him.

Overall a poor performance from Ward. Patchy. The 5 minute spell when he tried unsuccessfuly to regain authority and respect by cautioning every foul didn't help ! He frequently looked flustered and a little out of his depth.

He reached the pinnacle (internationals, Premier League) as a lino at a young age. Well if he thinks he's going to make it to the top as a referee on this sort of form, he's mistaken.

 

[OldBlueLady]

Well, the Macca one was just in front of us and you must have seen something we didn't cos there was minimal contact, and nothing meriting a booking that we could see (and that's not just me, but others round me that are not usually so defensive!).

 

[mattytheshrimper]

when macca got booked the ref pointed around the pitch. even though the tackle he did to actually get the booking it was was previous tackles.

same as barney the ref was just looking to book macca. it was always going to happen.

 

[BILLERICAY BLUE]

Macca's was for persistent infringement as well.

 

[OldBlueLady]

Macca's was for persistent infringement as well.

In his opinion, in both cases - Barney didn't get one go his way all night don't think, and Macca was VERY restrained compared to normal. Yet, Franny Laurent and Barney were both getting taken down all over the place - how Gillingham escaped without a red card anywhere I don't know, and yet as I sad earlier it wasn't REALLY a dirty game.

 

[Sean 2]

I thought Barney got booked for gobbing off after the ref blew up to give a free-kick to the Gills, even though the opponent had sailed over Barney using his shoulders as a ladder!
Probably swore at him, as soon as he said something Barney looked like he wished he hadn't as Ward got busy with the notebook.

 

[SUFC_Al]

I thought Barney got booked for gobbing off after the ref blew up to give a free-kick to the Gills, even though the opponent had sailed over Barney using his shoulders as a ladder!
Probably swore at him, as soon as he said something Barney looked like he wished he hadn't as Ward got busy with the notebook.

That's how I remember it as well.