Once upon a time there was a kingdom ruled over a by a central authority. Responsibility for governing was delegated among a group of chieftains from whom total obedience was expected, but who were unanswerable to the masses below them. The merit of and need for these chieftains was universally acknowledged among the people, but as their decision-making became less accurate and more erratic dissent grew within the proletariat.
A select few of the most venerable elders within the community took it upon themselves – without claiming to speak on behalf of anyone but those whose interests they directly served – to speak out against what they perceived as injustices. Yet because their objections were made on such immediate levels, only serving a select few, unity between the dissenters seemed impossible: petty squabbling over minor details was hindering overall progress. They were being robbed of what was most valuable to them, but bureaucracy and internal bickering was making their quest for justice ineffectual.
It’s a universal point of view held among fans that referees are robbers. That last minute penalty or the red card that never was hang over each of us like too many whiskies the night before for days after the incidents occurred, but when a dubious decision goes our way the referee’s ‘providence’ in giving it is immediately forgotten as the team’s performance and the genius of individuals take centre stage. To say that it is a difficult thankless job is clichéd to the extent of bordering on dogmatic.
That doesn’t mean however that it should remain that way: an unchallenged, rigid and assertive fact. If the right way is to be universally evident it must constantly be challenged and compared with the wrong, so that all are reminded regularly why one direction is being taken over another and why ours is the correct path to take. This requires a regular rigorous examination of the officials’ duties, responsibilities and equally importantly, their rights. Questions also have to be asked above the usual stations: to what extent are the people the referees work for making their job difficult and could they be doing more or less to help?
The officials are meant to be the authority on the football pitch; the black and white of the game embodied in a firm, considered cop, which can then be juxtaposed with the vibrant colours of all the teams, players and personalities they oversee. The players and managers are out to get what they want by means fair or foul – “you’ve got to die for three points” ECT – and it is up to the officials to stop them. At the moment though, I can’t work out who are the cops and who are the robbers.
(I would normally shy away from the brash Americanism of ‘cops’ and opt instead for ‘policeman’, but the former is unisex and rolls off the tongue better in conjunction with robbers, as well as seeming more suitable for the subject given the officials’ preference for the formal title of ‘assistant referee’ over the more articulate but inherently sexist ‘linesman’.)
Straight to the crux of the argument then: we’re told referees cannot be held publically accountable for their actions because it will diminish respect for them within the game. In other words, by elaborating on and explaining their decisions and therefore accepting liability when mistakes are inevitably made, they are made weak and powerless. Their strength (apparently) lays in their infallibility, or rather the infallibility of the organisation they represent – broadly speaking, the official rules of Association Football.
This is the company line of a multi-billion pound industry in the 21st Century: we know better than you and rather than question us, just accept it. There are ideological parallels between this regime and the ones being toppled weekly in the Middle East and North Africa, and after another week of civil unrest and murmurs of revolution you have to feel it’s a case of when rather than if change will come. When is technology going to be introduced to help referees?
FIFA claim that the reason no decision was made regarding the implementation of goal-line technology at a recent convention (aside from the fact they had more pressing business to discuss regarding snoods) is that no company could satisfactorily provide a quick enough relay of information between the official’s monitor and the ref. They said that the speed of play was integral to the modern game and this could not be sacrificed for vastly improved accuracy, accountability and consistency in officiating. While the game evolves, the referees are forced to stagnate.
While technology is constantly being integrated into the playing of football – lighter boots, (apparently) better balls, the most up-to-date and relevant tactical information available at any time – referees are expected to keep up with these innovations using the same tools they used when the Jabulani was made of a pig’s bladder: their eyes and their ever-popular common-sense. While I don’t necessarily agree successes in other sports mean it will automatically work in football but everyone else does seem to be looking forward while FIFA and the regional chieftains it delegates governing responsibilities to bury their toupeed heads in the sand and stand intransigently by officials. I mean, talk about the blind leading the blind.
A point was made to Robbie “BBC’s- working-class-face-of-football” Savage on 606 this weekend that the referee on the pitch be no more than the mouth-piece of a panel of video officials, in whom all the authority would lie, and who would rely all decisions to him. While this extreme would lead to the game becoming a bastardisation of American Football – with five minute stops for every thirty seconds of play – some attempt must be made to find a middle ground between this revolutionary standpoint and the archaic mistrust of anything new currently enforced by those in power.
For a sport so regularly touted as the only global language, it is embarrassing how little public discussion there is between footballing bodies regarding how best to move the game forward. It’s ridiculous that the annual meetings on anything of real importance are held entirely behind closed doors by men (exclusively men) with a worse grasp of the real world than King Eric. When do you think Blatter last queued and forked out for those priceless derby-day tickets in the away end?
Instead, any discussion that does take place regarding referees invariably starts with character assassinations from managers who feel they’ve been fucked by the long dick of law. This is then met with a venomous media backlash and a pitiful slap on the wrist from the football authorities, before the cycle is repeated next week. It only serves to widen the gulf between the rulers and the ruled, the lawmakers and the lawbreakers, the cops and the robbers.
* * * *
Once upon a time there was a kingdom ruled over a by a central authority. Responsibility for governing was delegated among a group of chieftains from whom total obedience was expected, but who were unanswerable to the masses below them. The merit of and need for these chieftains was universally acknowledged among the people, but as their decision-making became less accurate and more erratic dissent grew within the proletariat.
All was once well in the realm, with exceptional harvests, an estimably advanced population and the wisest king in power, creating the highest standard of living available anywhere in the known world. Yet decadence crept in and the institutions that had once served the domain so well began to show unmistaken signs of decay. All is no longer well at in the kingdom of Old Trafford.
Rule number one of being a United fan: thou shall not question Sir Alex. Under his authority the club have achieved practically unthinkable things and his legacy is one which, even at a clubs of such a stature and proud history will take some beating. An integral part of his authority has always been his ability to delegate key responsibilities to key players and for them to enforce his will within the squad on the pitch. At Anfield on Sunday, his band of chieftains imploded.
‘Fergie-Time (noun): 1. Additional time at the end of addition time granted by the referee in order to allow Manchester United to score a late goal; 2. Cheating’. This concept best sums up the widely held view that the club are the Premier League’s Ocean’s Eleven: a smooth, suited and booted team of individual who take what they want from others with a certain amount of style, but a considerable amount of illegality.
Over the years the team’s style of play has been characterised by swift, incisive passing football involving the ball being pinged from defence to attack and back as many times as necessary before a breakthrough presents itself. Subsequently the midfield is the crucial component to success, hence why the majority of modern icons have been midfielders: your Beckhams and your Ronaldos. At the moment, the midfield simply is not good enough.
The cops in this analogy are the aforementioned chieftains to whom Fergie delegates, players are invariably found in the midfield – Paul Scholes and Ryan Giggs being the perfect examples. And as was shown on Sunday, they aren’t able to patrol the beat like they used to. This is through no fault of their own: both are in the twilight years of their careers and rather than being relied on from 65 minutes onwards to sure things up or provide an alternative threat, they are the arthritic spine of the team that is proving unsurprisingly brittle when presented with punishing labour.
The robbers in the United team are the love-‘em-or-hate-‘em midfielders – Keane, Beckham, Ronaldo, Nani – who make the difference when you most need it: pinching late goals, stealing dubious free-kicks and getting away manslaughter. And while Nani has done admirably in taking on you-know-who’s mantle of United’s best talent and worst person this season, he is but one man. He is still not quite the complete player, showing infuriating inefficiencies in his game – whether it’s failing to clear the first man with his corners or being absent defensively (although I wish he was on Sunday), but is at least getting there.
The bigger worry is the back-up divisions. Carrick continues to resemble a Geordie papier-mâché swan – pretty to look at for a time but with the spine of Withnail and the incision of Andy Parson’s wit– while Fletcher seems to have fallen foul of the dreaded Curse of the Scot – he’s silently brilliant while everyone thinks he’s shite but as soon as the public realise he’s decent he bottles it and becomes crap. Youngsters Anderson and Gibson would be a good player if former’s physicality and defensive ability could be hybridized with the latter’s shooting and passing, but are looking more and more like they lack the credentials to hold down numbers 4 and 8 in the eleven.
And the wingers are even worse. Obertan and Bebe are…terrible. I really can’t think of any adjectives suitable for such abject failures. Valencia’s return provides some hope for excitement on the flanks and the importance of a hard-working, reliable winger (i.e. Park) was painfully demonstrated at Anfield, but it would be severely stretching the truth to say that any of these midfielders – central or wide – will be able to steal from other teams now or at any point in the future. At the moment they’re robbing points from the team by playing so badly.
None either are displaying any of the mental credentials Ferguson looks for in future lieutenants, begging the question: who will inspire once Scholes and Giggs follow G Funk into creaky idolatry? If the cycle is broken now after twenty highly-effectual years, what are the implications for future generations?
Personally I think we need at least two, ideally four new players, with the immediate deficit in the middle of the park. An experienced, combative midfielder of the mould of Bastian Schweinsteiger and a promising young talent who looks like he might deliver (and preferably who Fergie has seen play), such as Rodwell or Henderson, both of whom United have been frequently linked with in recent times. Signing wingers can be very tricky, as Bebe, Obertan and Tosic before them have shown, and it seems looking at home as well as abroad can unearth gems: look at Johnson at City or Albrighton at Villa.
Crucially though, we cannot keep placing responsibility for playing in the most important positions on the pitch with incredibly talented, but undoubtedly aging legends, and supplementing this with strikers played out of positions on the wings. Rooney’s best form will be found when he realises he’s not guaranteed a place on the team sheet, not winding him up further (if such a thing is possible) out on the left, while Hernandez’s biggest assest (his movement off the shoulder of the last man) is wasted when he asked to provide rather than benefit from the killer ball.
Until these problems are addressed, the once unstoppable Man United machine will screech, stutter and eventually stop. If United’s cops and robbers are ever going to combine with the scintillating results of the past, the script needs to be updated, the cast changed and the deadwood cleared. At the moment Ferguson is in danger of making Ocean’s 13, a jaded, haggard vision of what was once great and is now almost unwatchable.
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