Just after this column had finished at the end of last season, we had one of the biggest refereeing controversies for some years. I am talking, of course, about the resignation of England’s top referee, Graham Poll. It wasn’t so much his resignation that caused the controversy as his criticism of the FA.
For anyone out of the country at the time, let me recall what his complaint was. His main attack was about the treatment (or the lack of it) by the FA against leading Premiership managers. Most of this stemmed from his sending off of Chelsea’s John Terry and the behaviour of the Chelsea management at this time. Terry made up a story that Poll had given one reason for his sending-off to players on the field and another to the manager after the game. This is something which Poll denied and claimed it was an attack on his integrity.
The video of the game shows that Poll actually said nothing at the time, merely showing the yellow card followed by a red, as it was a second cautionable offence.
Poll was annoyed that the FA took 25 days to charge Terry, during which time he felt his honesty was open to question. Terry later admitted that his claim was untrue and was fined £10,000 for improper conduct. That seems a lot of money but to someone earning £130,000 a WEEK, it was no more an irritant than a gnat bite. The Chelsea management received no rebuke for their part in this dispute.
Graham Poll said he believed that what he called the ‘inherent weakness of the FA’ was eroding the power of referees.
The FA said they were ‘disappointed’ by Poll’s remarks but, of course, they were no longer able to discipline him. The action they did take may be seen by some to be petulant: a training video for referees, which featured Poll in action was scrapped. This meant the whole video had to be reshot, putting it way behind its deadline. They had no argument against Poll’s competence but couldn’t bear the thought of someone who had criticised them, being used in a FA video.
Poll had, of course, broken one of refereeing's great taboos. All referees are told early in their career that they mustn’t question the punishment handed down. In other words, if a referee sends a player off, he is told that he has done his job, it is of no concern to him what disciplinary action is taken against the player.
Shortly after the Poll outburst, I attended the national Referees' Conference at which the top speakers were all Premiership referees and they all had that same message, no doubt prompted by the FA. Mike Riley, who,
as I’ve mentioned before, is an excellent speaker, made the final presentation which was entitled ‘Protecting the image of the game’. He showed video clips of incidents of confrontation, simulation and brutal play, and asserted that every referee has a role to play in protecting the image of the game but repeated the message that we should not concern ourselves with anything else.
The point of course that Poll was making, was that referees cannot protect the image on their own. If footballing authorities do not take sufficient and appropriate action against those who are spoiling the image, then they will continue to do so with impunity no matter what action referees take.
For example, the FA has said that it is concerned with the increasing practice of players surrounding referees to challenge decisions. But, as anyone who has watched them this season will know, Chelsea players, unreprimanded, still continue with this form of harassment.
What Poll said he fears, is that in the end referees will not take any action, if they see it to be futile in deterring footballers, players, managers and clubs.