Normally I back refs but

It's all about angles isn't it and a ref can only give what he sees from his angle. Also a ref has his finger on the pulse of the game, on the heat of it and the general spirit it is being played in and that make such a difference to the man management of it.

What "goes with the flow" in one game might need stamping down on in another. I'll give you an example...................Tommy Smith runs into Norman Hunter and we all close our eyes and wait for the impact, they get up dust themselves down and get on with it.

Didier Drogba falls over for the umpteenth time and the ref has to immediately decide whether it is due to the windy conditions (well the player has got gloves on) or the close proximity of Wayne Rooney.

In one situation the ref has nothing to do although serious injury could have occurred and in the other he's got a potential Sun headline on his case when the most likely outcome would be the need for a change of Drogba's gloves because they've now got mud on them.

Take that magnificent "nicking" of the ball off Green's feet as he prepared to shoot for goal on Friday....................how many outside the touchline (on the Pop) screamed for a penalty? Yet they were wrong weren't they. What about when Sills was pulled back by the last defender? How many shouted for a red card? But the ball was already right under the keeper's nose by then - Sills would never have reached it; so the ref was absolutely correct again...............a probable goalscoring opportunity hadn't been denied which is the criteria for a red card.

With official linesmen, instructions though variable; will deal with "grey" areas of the pitch - again I'll give you an example as if I'm the ref and you're the linos: "In the quarter between you and I, give me first bite at a decision if you see a foul, see if I'm applying advantage and look where I'm holding my whistle before you even think about flagging. I don't want two of us showing publicly two different opinions! Discuss it with me at half time or after the final whistle please. In the other quarter (the far side to you) do the same again but take a more pro-active role if you think I've missed something.

The first instruction is because we are both looking through any incident along the same line from different ends and the second because we have totally different angles of vision (in theory!)

In South Devon League football club linos are common place, though in many areas (Plymouth was one in my day) they were not used and refs would handle the game without them. I would only expect a club lino to deal with offsides and balls in and out of play but encourage them to look at me before getting involved in flagging for a foul I may have missed right under their nose. I certainly wouldn't want them getting involved as an official lino would for incidents on the far side or in cases where a possible disciplinary case would involve who heard what and who allegedly said what. I would take that on board single handed and if my attention was drawn to something that someone had said by a club lino but I hadn't heard it myself, I would deal with it verbally with the player but without recourse to a card and a possible disciplinary hearing that would hinge on the ambiguity of what might or might not have been said or intended.

Common sense is the most important factor and I think we all need to take on board the fact that many of the refs (like many of the players) in the BSP are young and on the ladder upwards. Like it or lump it, we have to accept that they are still gaining experience and if we want the top refs we bloody well have to get into top football................we have never been there!

Guys I was an official ref at junior and senior reserve level, these people in black doing our games recently have been shockingly poor. Merse I know exactly what you mean about angles we were taught that to make the most of what you have got you need to run pretty much a diagonal line from one corner flag to the other with the linesman running the lines away from your diagonal, which gives you the most coverage of events and angles. Local refs with no linesmen do a far better job than what we have witnessed recently at Plaimoor is all I was trying to get across, its almost like they have another agenda and we are not privvy to what they have been told. In no game have we lost due to the descision making of officials BUT it does not make the game a better spectacle when the incompedent git in the middle gets nearly everything wrong!