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Letter from the President Regarding Referee Situation

By Mark Grommesh, 09/24/21, 6:45PM CDT

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Letter from the President Regarding Referee Situation

Letter from the President regarding the Current Referee situation.

Letter from the President

Coaches, Parents,

These are unprecedented times for soccer in NTX.  The Referee roles across NTX are down 40% from pre-covid and there is now more soccer being played than ever.  Every assignor and league of every level is short on referees and while we have plan together and doing our best to recruit and  re-engage the Refs on the GLASA we are still over 30 referees short from where we really need to be on a week to week basis.

We will no longer cancel games due to a Referee shortage, all teams will be asked to play their games as scheduled and in many cases you may not have a full crew, many may not even have a single Ref.  While we continue to look at solutions and communicate with our Refs to find the reasons they are not able to work we will be asking coaches and parents to help step in where possible and needed, to get the games played by taking the roles of "Club Linesmen" and even Center Referees.  I wanted to go through some guidelines for those situations.

Coaches:

  • Please be sure to bring a whistle, and a watch to your games 
  • If there are no Referees for your game, be prepared to have each coach act as or provide a Referee for half of the game, or recruit a knowledgable parent or other spectator to assume the role
  • For Safety - Monitor your own players and if you have anyone playing rough - pull them off to avoid any injury and settle them down prior to re-inserting them
  • DO NOT BE CRITICAL OF ANY PERSON PERFORMING THE JOB OF REFEREE OR LINESMAN

Club Linesman

  • If you are willing to be a Club Linesman (work a line in a three man crew) You are NOT allowed to call off-side, 
  • You CAN assist with directions for the ball going out over the touch line and whether a ball over the goal line should be a corner or goal kick.  
  • You are NOT allowed to call fouls, but you can give your opinion regarding a play if asked what happened by the Center Ref

Spectators

  • Understand the the #1 reason Referees quits is coach / spectator abuse - Even simple statements yelled like " Come on Ref", "Call the Foul" can be heard and have a lasting effect of many of the young refs.  These refs need to work games to get better and if they quit early due to abuse they never get that experience to get better.  Please be polite and police the other spectators so that we all Respect or Referees.
  • In Many cases you may have a new referee in the center of your game - please be patient and let them do the job to the best of their availability.

I know this is not welcome news and rest assured we are doing everything we can to fix the situation.  We are asking for your patience and cooperation.  GLASA will have mentors working with our refs every Saturday to answer questions and try to give them more confidence in their ability. 

Feel free to contact your Commissioner with any ideas or comments.  I will personally be at Lake Park on most Saturdays if you would like to speak with me.  If you have any comments regarding the Referees who work the games, please give them your positive re-enforcement, but direct any negative or constructive thoughts to our Director or Referees, Daniel Nunez at referee.director@glasasoccer.org for constructive follow-up.

Thank You for your patience and cooperation

Mark Grommesh
President
Greater Lewisville Area Soccer Association