[Other Sport] Rugby Union Referees

[nwgull]

Because rugby players at all ages are taught the referee’s word is final. This was always the way long before a video assistant. Parents, coaches ingrain this, abide by this. I saw this in field hockey too, any lip and kids are withdrawn from the game by their coaches. It’s the entire ethos of these sports.

Football all the way down to kids has a culture of bullying officials, overtly biased mouthy parents, officials are abused. Only clubs/coaches with an iron fist on respect quash it. Winning at all costs is so often everything.

R5 have often held informative phone ins on the subject, with input from football or rugby parents and officials. The most telling comments come from parents who’ve taken their kids to both sports, they report two different worlds.

The reasons? Culture, history, parents/kids desperate to get rich from football?

I don't know, I've seen some shocking behaviour from touch-line parents at Sunday morning rugby. Was once involved in a situation where the coaches/parents of the away team were getting so angry at the referee (provided by the home team) that they refused to let their lads come out for the second half and took the team home.

I was 10 going on 11 at the time, so had no idea about how good or bad the ref was, but I do know that he would've just been doing his best job so that a load of U12s could have a game of rugby. It left 16 boys dissapointed that they only got half a game and a another 16 lads (due to play in the B team match) dissapointed that they didn't any sort of game. This was a under 12's match, the result of which meant absolutely f*** all to anyone.

 

[mikeyjh]

Because rugby players at all ages are taught the referee’s word is final. This was always the way long before a video assistant. Parents, coaches ingrain this, abide by this. I saw this in field hockey too, any lip and kids are withdrawn from the game by their coaches. It’s the entire ethos of these sports.

Football all the way down to kids has a culture of bullying officials, overtly biased mouthy parents, officials are abused. Only clubs/coaches with an iron fist on respect quash it. Winning at all costs is so often everything.

R5 have often held informative phone ins on the subject, with input from football or rugby parents and officials. The most telling comments come from parents who’ve taken their kids to both sports, they report two different worlds.

The reasons? Culture, history, parents/kids desperate to get rich from football?

They have but I would add that criticising referees is and their decisions is a huge part of their coverage & phone ins etc - Pundits, former players, commentators, presenters and fans seem to fail to recognise that this is part of the same cultural problem that you describe