DIRECTOR OF REFEREES’ REPORT

Mr. George Elias

The season kicked off on the weekend of the 6 & 7 March with trials. With only 3 grounds and 16 games, all referees appointed officiated without any pull outs or requests for change of grounds. I thought the job was easy. Things deteriorated from then. Almost every weekend thereafter it was necessary to make changes.

It was not always our members doing, as sometimes the Junior League made late changes. The majority of our members were able to fulfil their appointments, however there are some who requested late changes, where it was obvious that they would have known of their weekend commitments before the appointments were made.

Active referees are to take note that one request for a change or pull out, could require many phone calls to cover that one change. It also means your fellow referee(s) have to over commit from what they originally thought they had to do.

The trials ran over 4 weeks and for the first time, the referees were paid. Due to restrictions on only refereeing Sunday trials and only games involving Canterbury teams, we were able to cover all games. I would like to thank all those referees who officiated in these trials, mostly during the hottest part of the day.

The season proper commenced in early April, with sadly 12 referees not officiating from the previous year. This is a serious concern and the Association is doing everything possible to limit this. We lost a few more during the season, one of which was my son. Whilst this was disappointing to me personally, I have come to realise that referees are a special breed and that referees are born, not made.

On a positive note, we picked up 7 new referees, during the year. This does not count Matt Hewitt, who came out of retirement to do an Under 17’s line. To Feras, the referee of that game, you have bragging rights which very few district referees have. i.e. having an ex first grade referee running your line.

During the season we were able to provide referees & touch judges to all matches, except for the occasional touch judges on a Saturday afternoon to Under 14’s matches. This was due to generally having the games at different grounds and

therefore having to move referees to do just the one line after they had completed their refereeing commitments for the day.

The number of games scheduled on a Saturday night provided us with some challenges and with the Junior League in favour of having more games scheduled for Saturday nights, this is going to put more pressure on us.

We again had a rotation system in place for approximately the first 10 weeks of competition, for our top 6 referees. I believe this worked well, both for our referees who got the opportunity to referee games from A grade to Under 17’s, and the players who were able to be exposed to a greater variety of referees.

With none of our referees in the current Junior Representative squad, we selected 5 referees who we thought have potential and they were given extra training, and if necessary and we felt they were suitable & capable, would be considered for preferential appointments. I believe this was only partially successful and we will need to fine tune this next year. We were lucky to have Stephen Clapson, from the NSW Advisory Board, come and review three of these squad members and I am sure they received some real benefit from his advice.

For the first time our three senior competitions, Under 19’s, 21’s & A grade were combined with Souths, Balmain & St George. As we only supplied referees & touch judges to games played in our district, some referees could have being appointed to grades which may have seemed like they were being dropped or promoted, but it was only because of the number of games in particular grades being played in our district.

The number of complaints received were minimal and minor in nature. The most significant one was the inconsistent application of the Safe Play & Mini/Mod rules. A letter from Head Body re affirmed the rules, and I believe towards the end of the year we certainly had improved. It is something that all active referees will need to work on in the future. The rules are their for the safety of the players and most parents will expect us to apply them as they are written and intended.

On behalf of my two assistants, Kim & Joe and myself, we would like to congratulate all the referees who officiated in the final series and in particular the Grand Finals. Special congratulations to Reg Marks who for the second year running took out the Clubb Johnson award, as our No. 1 ranked referee & Nathan

Loveday who took out the Farrelly Dick trophy as the most improved referee. These two awards are highly competitive and sought after and our choices were not easy and involved much discussion.

We would also like to congratulate Nathan Loveday, and his chaperone, Dave Turvey, on being selected to referee on the Sunshine Coast, and Reg Marks & Joe Attard (I’m still not sure who was the chaperone) who went to Perth as part of our exchange program . I’m sure they both gained much experience and enjoyed their trip.

Our appreciation and thanks goes out to all Advisory Board members, especially those who committed themselves nearly every weekend. We will continue to strive to report on as many referees as possible, however we have restrictions with our graded members, who having increasing commitments, are very limited in their opportunities to go out and report. In total, this year we did 108 reports, including semi finals, with all referees being seen at least 3 times. We believe we can improve on these numbers and the consistency & quality of the reports.

I would like to acknowledge the commitment of some active referees whose availability is endless and find it difficult to say ‘no’ when I ask them at very late notice, of a change in their appointments or to do extra games. Without you, there would have been days when we would have had difficulty in filling all appointments. I won’t mention them, but I think you know who you are, and your efforts are greatly appreciated.

It was unfortunate that earlier in the year we had a hacker, who contacted some referees advising them of forfeits or changes in their appointments, which were all bogus. It caused some problems, but all games were able to go ahead. The matter was referred to the Police, but the culprit was not found .

I would like to thank John, Mario & all the Committee for their assistance during the year. There were times when my role was consuming a lot of time and I doubted myself as to whether I was capable of continuing. The confidence they instilled in me, allowed me to continue.

To the district club and Kevin Shanahan & his committee, I thank them for their cooperation and responding to my concerns in a timely manner.

Finally, I personally would like to acknowledge the work done, and thank Kim & Joe, my assistants, for their dedication to the role and all the assistance they have given me. Tuesday evenings were always very busy trying to finalise all appointments.

In my role as Director, there were a number of occasions, when I had to polish off my boots, as a late call up, because there was no else I could get. I’m not sure whether this has given me the bug to come out of retirement again, or it is just a

temporary apparition. I will be considering my options, and obviously if I decide to be active again, I will not be nominating or this role in 2011.

George Elias

DIRECTOR OF REFEREES