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In Sunday’s semi-final encounter between the Brisbane Roar and Melbourne Victory, the Victory had a goal-line clearance waved on and a strong penalty chance denied.
The two decisions would ultimately prevent a Melbourne equaliser and saw Brisbane progress to next week’s grand final against the Wanderers.
The legitimacy of both claims have been thoroughly discussed by Mark Bosnich and the Fox Sports football commentary team.
They seemed to suggest that the referee cost Melbourne any hopes of victory when he chose not to penalise Matt Smith for his challenge on Mark Milligan.
As to be expected, Victory coach Kevin Muscat was infuriated by the call (or lack thereof) and it appears a large majority of fans are sympathising with the plight of the Melbourne team.
This certainly is not the first refereeing incident in the A-League to court controversy. Only several weeks ago, Brisbane had their own miscarriage of justice when a Thomas Broich pile driver was incorrectly adjudged to have not crossed the line.
The mistake, while ultimately not affecting the outcome of the game, did create a few blushes for the FFA, and fans, forcing them into the action of investigating additional referees. It also joined a long laundry list of complaints from A-Leagues managers, fans and analysts about officiating that has adversely affected the outcome for their team.
At the risk of whipping a dead horse just one more time, I pose the question: is it time that the A-League adopted additional measures of adjudication?
At present, world football has produced two separate measures in response to the years of ongoing refereeing blunders. The additional assistant (or fifth referee), and goal-line technology. As with most progress in the game of football, FIFA has been slow to adopt either of the measures.
Goal-line technology has been in development by FIFA since the start of the 2000s, and while the organisation has long been hesitant to implement it on a grand scale, growing success stories are evident.
The English Premier League has used the technology for the 2013-14 season, and international tournaments such as the 2012 FIFA Club World Cup and 2013 Confederations Cup have also embraced it. FIFA has also more recently committed to its use at the 2014 World Cup in Brazil.
Overall, I suspect that goal-line technology will be adopted as worldwide standard within a few years, including Australia’s own A-League. It has been a long time coming and is an advancement that provides better outcomes without necessarily rocking the boat too much.
The same cannot be said for additional assistant referees, however it also offers the greatest opportunity for improving the quality of the officiating in Australian and world football.
Additional referees stalking the touch line would likely spell a great reduction in the blunders outlined previously.
Some may claim that Sunday’s example is proof that the presence of a referee does not guarantee better decisions. After all, he a relatively unobstructed line of sight.
However, a pragmatic review of the incident shows him quite far from the action and, in the dying moments of finals football, every referee is going to be hesitant in that position. It is an unfortunate reality of any competitive sport, but something capable of improvement.
The measure of fifth officials has already been implemented in the 2012 European Cup, as well as the UEFA Champions League and Europa Cup, and a number of domestic leagues from a variety of different continents. These examples indicate the relative success of the initiative: better coverage of the playing field, fairly seamless operation, and a distinct lack of confusion or discord.
To use an even more damning example, I present the NRL.
In a sport notorious for the fans dislike of officiating interference or for sacrificing the game’s fluidity in return for more robust decision-making, an additional referee in the ruck area was introduced a few seasons ago. It has been overwhelming positive for the sport in general.
At the risk of trying to keep-up-with-the Joneses, if a sport that so clearly values the lack of intervention from the officiating can benefit from additional adjudication, then surely the A-League can too.
After all, most of the casual or “on-the-fence” fans of the A-League are the same ones wary of a game where one poor decision can unfairly determine the winner of a match.
It is in the A-League’s best interests to provide a product that at least reduces the likelihood of such a scenario, and that’s the introduction of additional assistant referees.
It may not avoid all refereeing blunders, but it will almost certainly reduce them. The path to refereeing perfection is a long and arduous road that can only continue through moves such as this.
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