Week 1 Recap
The game chart for week 1 is available for your viewing as an attachment on the bottom of the weekly schedules page. Take a peek at it ensure that what is there is what you actually did. I can not go back more than a week to see if something conflicts with your records. Check it out before next week's games and if you think there is an issue, shoot me an email.
Thank you for keeping the phone calls and texts to a minimum this week. My wife gave birth to our first child late Thursday evening and to say things are a bit hectic is an understatement. A huge thank you for those who agreed to help cover games at the very last minute. Another thank you for all the "mentors" who helped the "rookies". All mentors will get 1/2 game fee for their time for each game watched. For any mentors who did not shoot me an email yet on who they helped out, please do so. Nothing extravagant needed. Just what did they do well, what needs improvement and what level of play do you think they can handle. I always want to put everyone in a position to succeed.
I spoke with John Branca on Monday. Mostly positive, some negative and one case of feedback confirmed that needs to be addressed. The biggest takeaway from this week would be common sense, adaptability and balance. It is week 1 and many of these players are adapting or re-adapting to Futsal. This is a recreational league where most teams are using Futsal to get ready for the spring season. We have the responsibility to ensure a balance between safety, fair play and letting the players play. Common sense will dictate what rules can be bent (ie. kick ins on touchlines close to a wall) without it effecting the playing of the game. Having the ability to adapt will help in keeping a balance between what kind of contact players will accept (as long as it does not effect player safety) and play through and what they can or will not. Calling only the most obvious fouls can lead to player safety issues but calling EVERY foul (which I heard from multiple sources, happened at least once this past weekend) can lead to frustration from players, coaches and spectators and thus to discipline issues. Helping the players know where that line is while keeping a balance is what I am looking for in all my referees, especially in the older age groups.
Last thing, for that referee who called advantage, then let the player take a shot and then called a penalty kick because the goalkeeper made a save; don't do that again. The fact the attacker got a shot off IS the materialization of the advantage. The outcome after the shot is just the fruit of the materialized advantage. Think of the situation akin to the justice system's concept of double jeopardy. This play was two punishments for one foul where the punishment was originally suspended (advantage) for the original shot on target, then was punished again with the penalty kick when a goal wasn't scored even though no other crime (foul) was committed.