Umpiring Farce

[Prince]

Premier League Umpires get $175 a game... give or take a few bob!

[peanut]

New umpires boss Graham Glassford is so far doing a great job...

His communication to clubs requesting clarification to the proposed umpire allocation for 2006 has been excellant.

He has merely just explained to clubs that the league can not 100% confirm Premier League Reserve Grade will have umpires every week.

This is worst case.... Nothing to panick about just yet!!!

Gotta feel for Div II though... there are some cheating mongrels out there!!!

$175 a game prince... u kidding... what are you on??? Can anyone confirm???

[Coastal Boy]

Originally posted by peanut
New umpires boss Graham Glassford is so far doing a great job...

His communication to clubs requesting clarification to the proposed umpire allocation for 2006 has been excellant.

He has merely just explained to clubs that the league can not 100% confirm Premier League Reserve Grade will have umpires every week.

This is worst case.... Nothing to panick about just yet!!!

I dont knock anyone who do their best in the arena of umpiring. I do accept it is only a worse case scenario but how likely is it?????
Are their other preferable options???

[humphrey bear]

Originally posted by peanut
New umpires boss Graham Glassford is so far doing a great job...

His communication to clubs requesting clarification to the proposed umpire allocation for 2006 has been excellant.

It would be better to judge if he is doing a good job by the quantity and quality of umpires he produces not on his ability to write a letter.

[adnar]

Originally posted by tara
Who did or do you play for Adnar?

Balmain.

Their was only a few times throughout the season where it was beyond tolerable, but the umpires should not be in that position to begin with.

Our bloke always ended up penalising us more because he didn't want to seem partial.

[peanut]

H Bear,

that was the impressive part... he didnt hide behind a letter or email....(like past walnuts)

on the phone... explained all the pro's and con's!!!

[Joe Dirt]

Yea Prince your close. Premier league umpires are on approx $140 a game (there may be different levels of payment tho). Not bad for 2 hours work! I could handle my job if i was getting abused all the time for $70 an hour!

[House]

Umpires

This decision is almost farcical. How could the leagues preference be to allocate umpires to Division 1 ahead of premier league reserves. Other states would be laughing at the state of football in NSW and we should be embarrassed. Does the league ever consult anyone with any football knowledge before making these outragous decisions. Surely we should be putting resources into making the Premier Division the best possible competition in can be. We can then work on improving all grades below this up to a respectable standard. It is dead set embarassing to think that the premier league, the 'State Comp in NSW', have to provide umpires for it's reserve grade comp. Yet another mistake from those responsible for governing this competition.

[Northern_Swan]

We had to put up with a similar situation last year in the BDAFL. Initially, there were concerns as to player safety and concerns of bias etc, but it was really not that bad in most cases (there were some notable exceptions however). In fact, most of our Under 18 players prefered to have 2 club Umpires as opposed to appointed ones, as they were of the opinion that these club guys were better!

Unfortunately what it boils down to is that there is not enough people taking up the whistle after their playing days are done.

For about 50% of our Under 18 games last season, club umpires ran the games and about 3 or 4 Reserve games too. On the other hand, all of our under 14 games had 2 field umpires!

It is not that the pay is ordinary either as has been said previously- a field umpire got about $90 for a senior match up here IIRC. The fact of the matter is people cant be bothered running around getting abused for an afternoon.

In my opinion, for this trend of reducing umpire numbers is to stop, Players and Supporters need to change their attitude to those doing the officiating or there will be no-one left to officiate.

[swansrock4eva]

As has been said, numbers are the real issue, but quite seriously, who wants to become part of a group of "white maggots," known not for the job they have in governing a sport that can be damned hard to adjudicate on at the best of times even with all the experience in the world behind you, but for just being the scum of the earth because they chose to blow the whistle instead of kick the goals for whatever reason?

The bull@@@@ "year of the official" was a load of garbage, designed to make it look as though they were doing something to make it better for umps, yet they achieved very little (and I'm being generous with that statement from what I've seen), but as usual, love to talk it up.

What about education? I know last year I did my L1 coaching, and although I wasn't a fan of the course myself, the best thing I got out of it was in fact the section on umpiring - explaining rules that had never been explained properly, meaning that things I'd always thought were cut and dried one way, in fact, were totally the opposite. I suddenly found myself recognising better when umpires were going to make calls, and what they were going to call on, and I'm talking at all levels of footy, not just AFL level. If they could somehow get enough people to sit through that simple hour, maybe it would suddenly make people see that umps aren't always wrong, it's just that maybe we don't always understand the rule the way it's meant to be adjudicated. So either that means the rule is wrong, or it needs to be explained better from what I can tell? And as to the "every player receives an update on the rules each year," sure they may get one, but whether they read it and understand it is a totally different gig altogether!

There's a lot wrong with the state of umpiring the whole country over, and this is just the latest example of it.

[Rafters]

I guess it is fair to say that it is disappointing that umpiring numbers have diminished over the years & it is magnified with the increase in sides throughout Sydney ... I guess it is very hard to want to take up umpiring if you are going to cop abuse. Two good mates of mine & fellow premiership players from the Goannas (Dave "Trusty" Barwick & Steve "Digger" Graves) took up umpiring in the past few years - they are as fair as you can expect from umps with great knowledge of the game (Trusty played over 350 games for the Goannas alone!) yet they didn't like the abuse hurled on them purely because they were the umps in the middle.

I think players, coaches & spectators should have a real look at themselves & realise that the reasons why they lose games include:

* dropping marks;
* poor kicks/handpasses/disposals;
* lack of courage & commitment & communication
* lack of fitness (eg not training, poor diet, etc)
* lack of discipline (high tackles, not spoiling from behind, not manning up, etc)
* poor injury management
* coaching errors (not tagging, bad match-ups, favouring mates at the selection table, poor tactics, poor motivation, etc)

- I could go on & on

Those may think that one or two bad umpiring decisions affect the outcome of a game but it is the 50 errors by players that are the real reasons - those that blame the umps really have no idea about footy & will always try to shift the blame with their myopic views. All I can say to them is "wake up & smell the coffee"

If clubs have to provide umps there are going to be a few bad eggs amongst the lot - I played in one park cricket comp where there were no LBWs given in a whole season across all teams yet 6 given in the grand final with a proper "penguin" - I heard that Bob Altorjay's efforts were dubious in the SWS v Goannas match but I guess it did not affect the outcome of semi-final football as those two teams didn't win too many games in 2005. I would think that the start of a new season alone should motivate your team Tara.

So how do we as the Sydney football community fix the problem with the lack of umpiring numbers? Lets try & think of a few solutions.

Well the horse may have bolted this year, but I think that retiring players should be targetted by clubs & encouraged to umpire in future years.

Perhaps it is worthwhile training them up by getting them involved with junior umpiring in their latter years.

Financial inducement does help & perhaps this needs to be communicated alot more. I bet alot of guys would p rick their ears open for a few hundred bucks for spending a bit of time away on the weekend from the missus' nagging, watch a bit of footy & get a bit of fitness in as well.

Give clubs more points for recruiting umpires in the "Club of the Year" award.

Conversely, "fine" clubs that have players, coaches & spectators bag umpires in the "Club of the Year" award.

I am sure there are a number of solutions that we can come up with & not many of them need to involve the NSWAFL ... it is up to us to make the competition alot better with a bit of effort, a bit of thought & a bit of communication.

I reckon each club could easily recruit an umpire to the ranks between now & April 8 ... the challenge is there guys ... or you can continue to whinge & whine instead which can be alot easier for some people.

[humphrey bear]

Originally posted by Rafters


I am sure there are a number of solutions that we can come up with & not many of them need to involve the NSWAFL ... it is up to us to make the competition alot better with a bit of effort, a bit of thought & a bit of communication.

Rafters are you kidding?

The AFL is a multi million if not billion dollar industry. There charter is to administer, organise and oversee football nationally. They have emploees who are paid to do that.

Surely the responsibility for supplying umpires is not that of the clubs or supporters but falls wholey soley and squarely on the NSWAFL.

This is just another example of the lack of foresight and extreme incompetence of the group of jackasses that are and have been the NSW AFL for the last decade.

At some stage they have to take responsibility for something or do something to justify the money they are earning.

[wheels27]

I have been reading this thread with interest, and would like to add that I think one point that has not been made is about sheduling. I know we tend to blame the league for everything, but, given the small number of umps in Sydney, changing premier league games to saturdays signed the death warrant for any chance of umpires being available for Div 1. Many guys used to ump Div 1 on a Sat. and then do Prem. Lg on Sundays.

[tara]

Originally posted by wheels27
I have been reading this thread with interest, and would like to add that I think one point that has not been made is about sheduling. I know we tend to blame the league for everything, but, given the small number of umps in Sydney, changing premier league games to saturdays signed the death warrant for any chance of umpires being available for Div 1. Many guys used to ump Div 1 on a Sat. and then do Prem. Lg on Sundays.

Wheels I appreciate what you are saying and also appreciate the job that most of the umps do. Unfortunately the AFL doesnt do enough to ensure things are done properly. How many times last year did we end up having TBone umpire ressies and end up with 3 senior umpires in firsts? Surely one of the could have overseen ressies. Do you also recall our trial against UNSW/ES last preseason? It looked like an umpires convention.

[wheels27]

Spot on Colesy, just very poor management of resources.

The other thing that gets me too is that I don't really recall more than a handful of times in the last ten years I have seen a player really get ridiculously out of hand at an umpire (think McNab v Campbelltown), nor do I recall a regular umpire walking away from the game (same faces every year), so the argument of no-one wanting to receive abuse which we hear constantly seems a bit overplayed. In our games we are usually so appreciative of getting an ump to turn up, that he is in most danger of dislocating a shoulder from all the handshaking he receives after a game. Granted it's a tough job, but any new recruits (if there have been many) would surely not be put off if they spoke to the older guys. I get a feeling the league is so dismissive of our level, that then filters through the umpires ranks, and if they're not doing Premier firsts they are thought of as second class umps. More the attitude received from within than from the clubs seems an issue.