Refereeing Tribal Disputes

IT IS SAID down here in God's Orange County – East Ayrshire – that every other football rivalry, even that between those two big Glasgow clubs, pales into insignificance against oor wee local barney – Auchinleck Talbot v Cumnock. Actually, any other local team against “Scumnock” has the potential to get a bit tasty.

I well remember my big neighbour, the late Alex Jess, a man who bled for Glenafton Athletic, cautioning a bunch of local youths, getting excited at the presence of some Auchinleck youths at a game: “They are not your enemy,” said Alex, instead he pointed to a delegation of Cumnock committee members, watching the game since they would play the winners: “There is your enemy over there.”

The rivalry isn't as pronounced these days, since Talbot misplaced their Cloak of Invincibility and Cumnock has gone backwards at a speed befitting that legendary not to say mythical Ferrari-engined World War II tank, which went faster in reverse than forward, but, it still gets edgy when they meet.

But, back in the 1980s and 1990s, Police leave in Ayrshire was cancelled and the SFA used to use meetings between Talbot and Cumnock as a sort of passing-out parade for referees they were thinking of promoting to Grade One. The reasoning was, if they could get through that game, they could handle anything – even the Old Firm.

I have always maintaind, Dougie Smith, the referee much-maligned for his reaction to Paul Gascoigne showing him a yellow card, after Dougie dropped it during a game at Ibrox, got a raw deal. If you had handled as many Talbot v Cumnock games as Dougie did on his way up – your sense of humour would have gone too.

But, there was one meeting of the East Ayrshire rivals back in the day which has gone down in folk-lore. That particular season, their meetings were averaging something like three red and ten yellow cards per fixture. It was late in the season when the teams met, at Talbot's Beechwood ground, in a local cup tie.

Now, that season, FIFA and UEFA had, in their wisdom, decided to utilise “national” refereeing teams in the finals of their competitions. Previously, you might find a French referee operating with linesmen, one of whom was German, the other Italian, but the governing bodies decided, to go with officiating teams, all from the one nation.

The SFA took a belt and braces approach to this, nominating a team for that year's big tournament, all of whom were FIFA-grade referees. This meant, the guys with the flags would have to re-learn a skill they had not had to use for some seasons. So, to get them up to speed, the selected officiating team would be doing some local games as training for the big tournament.

Thus, referee Jim McCluskey, linesmen Hugh Dallas and Les Mottram and fourth official Willie Young rolled-up to officiate at this meeting of the Junior rivals.

There presence wasn't noted, until the quartet came out to warm-up, whereupon the players realised who they would be dealing with. A brief conference was held in the centre circle, involving both Club Captains and their First Lieutenants.

That game passed with narry a foul, it was as full-blooded as ever, but, there was none of the nonsense which usually occured; no bookings and a thoroughly-entertaining game was enjoyed by both sets of fans. The four officials also enjoyed their night in the wilds of East Ayrshire – particularly the legendary post-game purvey, supplied by the ladies of Auchinleck and the experience did them no end of good for the upcoming tournament.

So, why have I just penned some 600 words on Football, in a Rugby Union blog? Well, because, World Rugby has just revealed the match officials for this summer's internationals, that's why.

The headline news is that Ben O'Keefe, Andrea Piardi and Nika Amashukeli will, in that order, control the three Australia v British and Irish Lions tests. These are the main matches in a list of 38 summer games, in which Scottish officials will feature strongly.

Hollie Davidson's star continues to rise; she will have control of the June meeting between An England XV and A France XV, at Twickenham. Here she will have Sam Grove White on one line, Ireland's Eoghan Cross on the other, with Mike Adamson as TMO.

 

Hollie will also referee the first meeting of the summer between South Africa and Italy, be AR2 in their second meeting and AR1 for the meeting of South Africa and Georgia.

From Twickenham, Sam heads off to the USA, wheree he will referee The Eagles' meeting with Belgium, then be AR1 for their match with Spain and AR2 for their game against England.

While Hollie is in South Africa and Sam in the USA, Mike Adamson heads for South America, where he will be in the bunker as Fair Play Review Officer for the first meeting of Argentina and England, before moving into the TV truck as TMO for their second test.

Obviously, given the many years when our officials were in the wilderness when it came to big games, it is great to see Hollie, Sam and Mike getting as-many gigs as they are, but what a pity the likes of Finlay Brown or Andy McMenamy didn't get a call from Dublin, inviting them to participate this summer. I firmly believe that quintet, acting as a refereeing Team Scotland could do as good a job as any similar national team of officials, and a better job than most.

FIFA and UEFA now operate national teams across all their big games, I feel it is time World Rugby and the Six Nations also adopted this approach. If they did, we have a team of top-quality Scottish officials who could be among the best in the business.