Ref Watch Refwatch ......... Barnet (H)

[Mick]

Our head-to-head League record against Barnet is finely balanced with 9 wins, 9 losses and only 1 draw. This is despite them winning the last 4 games!! Our best season against them in the League was back in 2011/12 when we beat them 3-0 both home and away. Bilel Mohsni scored 4 of those goals, including the hat-trick at home. In the first season back after the war, we beat them 9-2 away in the second round of the Cup, having brushed aside Brush Sports away by 6-1 in round one. Everton, also away, proved stronger opposition in round three and we bowed out with a very creditable 4-2 defeat in front of over 50,000 (so 17 goals in 3 away cup ties!).

The team of officials has a decidedly East Anglian look to it. Man in charge is Aaron Farmer, a Chartered Accountant from Colchester, who is in his second season as a National League, and therefore now National List, referee. This will be his first Southend National League match, although he has refereed a couple of our Essex Senior Cup matches. The first was at Roots Hall against Brentwood then the following year at Braintree.

He has also made numerous appearances at Roots Hall as either Assistant or Fourth Official and he also performed the latter role at Barnet the season before last – a fine 3-0 away victory.

This season’s 8 games in the National League have seen 34 yellows and 2 reds. He has also done a load of Fourth Officiating in the Football League including a few Championship games.

Assisting will be Ryan Head and Bradley Mingay both from the Norwich area. Ryan Head was also an Assistant at that Barnet away match mentioned above. Bradley Mingay is an International Transport Manager working in Lowestoft.

Fourth Official is Matthew Norton from Waltham Cross, Hertfordshire.

 

[Harry Bullocks]

Top job Mick.

 

[Whispering Bob]

A Farmer from c*lchester, you couldn’t make it up.

 

[Hooly]

The ref has already proved a complete C U Next Tuesday. Going to be a long afternoon.

 

[Holy Joe]

The ref has already proved a complete C U Next Tuesday. Going to be a long afternoon.

He can still redeem himself

 

[manor15]

Enough said.

https://twitter.com/x/status/1880671231378436224

 

[cerbera45]

was it the ref that disallowed it or was it the d*ckhead West stand lino ?!?

 

[ace]

Terrible set of officials. I should be used to the standard by now, but most are truly awful.

 

[Leeboy]

the West stand lino was clearly colourblind - couldn’t tell orange from blue

 

[OldBlueLady]

Numerous foul throws by the #11, Kanu missed 1st half by the West lino as well as getting a throw in completely wrong. Every foul given against us first half, yet barely anything in our favour despite the fact that they were grappling and blatantly shirt pulling.

Terrible.

 

[Leigh_Seasider]

Numerous foul throws by the #11, Kanu missed 1st half by the West lino as well as getting a throw in completely wrong. Every foul given against us first half, yet barely anything in our favour despite the fact that they were grappling and blatantly shirt pulling.

Terrible.

I get that, but unfortunately at this level we’re going to encounter this - teams using every trick in the book and inept officials. We’ve struggled to cope with this side of non league football since arriving in the NL, we need to find ways of dealing with it. Note when a decision doesn’t go our way and how our players react vs how other teams’ players react ..

 

[jackj13]

Aside from the wrongly disallowed goal the best bit was where he completely lost control of it with the challenge on Walker. Clear foul, lets it go. Walker is then swung round and launched to the floor. Blows numerous times to stop the game, not knowing what to do then gives them a free kick he hadn't given in the first place!

Unfortunately for a number of reasons we have a mass shortage of refs in this country so many who aren't ready are fast tracked. No ref goes out to purposely have a bad game but the standard isn't great. But that's a long long discussion for another day.

 

[fbm]

Aside from the wrongly disallowed goal the best bit was where he completely lost control of it with the challenge on Walker. Clear foul, lets it go. Walker is then swung round and launched to the floor. Blows numerous times to stop the game, not knowing what to do then gives them a free kick he hadn't given in the first place!

Unfortunately for a number of reasons we have a mass shortage of refs in this country so many who aren't ready are fast tracked. No ref goes out to purposely have a bad game but the standard isn't great. But that's a long long discussion for another day.

Agreed, but I'm not sure it's for that many reasons. The abuse dished out to them by parents, coaches and spectators at grass roots level is a huge factor I would think and stops many more people getting into it. We're all guilty of that although I try to be less critical after I reffed half a game once and found it one of the hardest things I've ever had to do, football wise.

 

[smudgster]

Numerous foul throws by the #11, Kanu missed 1st half by the West lino as well as getting a throw in completely wrong. Every foul given against us first half, yet barely anything in our favour despite the fact that they were grappling and blatantly shirt pulling.

Terrible.

I questioned a referee regarding foul throws. Now as long as you have part of your foot on the line it is acceptable. (as long as the other foot is behind the line or on it)

 

[Swiss Tony]

Ref needs looking at, his performance was well below par and the disallowed goal was just ****ing shocking.

 

[londonblue]

I questioned a referee regarding foul throws. Now as long as you have part of your foot on the line it is acceptable. (as long as the other foot is behind the line or on it)

That's only part of it. Another part being that you start with the ball behind your head, not on top of your head as the Barnet player did yesterday. How anyone can become a professional footballer and not actually be able to get that right is beyond me.

Personally think the ref was out of his depth. Barnet's use of the dark arts went unnoticed from the start. They were almost on a par with Borehamwood. I lost count of the number of times we had our shirts pulled (often off the ball), not to mention the amount of times they blocked off runners by stepping across their path and body checking us, also all off the ball.

 

[coxinthebox]

I have no evidence that the ref was biased rather than just incompetent, though the decision to disallow our goal was so bad it did make me wonder. I did a bit of digging and found his old Twitter account. As mentioned at the top of the thread, he is from Colchester. Some of his tweets, admittedly from 2011, are ‘get in there # colu’ and ‘up the u’s, up the u’s, up the good ol’ white and blues’.
I wonder if he has declared a potential conflict of interest to the NL? I know in the Prem and I think the EFL you are not allowed to ref the team from the place you are from or one of their local rivals. Either way think his performance needs investigating.

 

[OldBlueLady]

I have no evidence that the ref was biased rather than just incompetent, though the decision to disallow our goal was so bad it did make me wonder. I did a bit of digging and found his old Twitter account. As mentioned at the top of the thread, he is from Colchester. Some of his tweets, admittedly from 2011, are ‘get in there # colu’ and ‘up the u’s, up the u’s, up the good ol’ white and blues’.
I wonder if he has declared a potential conflict of interest to the NL? I know in the Prem and I think the EFL you are not allowed to ref the team from the place you are from or one of their local rivals. Either way think his performance needs investigating.

Wow, that needs taking further. Shocking.

 

[Shrimper]

https://twitter.com/x/status/1880993711007715741

Disgraceful

 

[lreed567]

What a joke, he was absolutely awful, almost as bad as our performance