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'Respect the ref'

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My support for the 2010 SWC goes without saying but 2 things rile.

Firstly, I thought it was an offence for soccer players to "take a dive". No? Well so far, I haven't seen a single booking for "diving"  and I'll tell you this for free: It's not for lack of trying on behalf of those revered, tattooed (but that's another story entirely) and overpaid soccer players.

They honestly carry on like a bunch of prima ballerinas attempting to practice their art in the midst of a primary school rugby game.

And that brings me to my second point: The Referee. In Australian rules, the ref is called the "Immaculate Umpire", a concept that soccer clearly doesn't understand, albeit a bit tongue-in-cheek.

Firstly, the ref should be respected. Watching some of the players berate, curse and blatantly abuse referees astounds me. As in Cricket and Rugby, they should enforce this respect, in my humble opinion.

Some of the officials have taken to trying to stamp their authority on the game, booking any and every minor offence that they see, or think they see and this is also undesirable, because it leads to so very many yellow and red cards, making the game less of a spectacle for the money paying fans.

Of course, respect also needs to be earned. And therein lies a serious problem currently. The standard of refereeing leaves a lot to be desired at SWC 2010. They don't book players for the right reasons like taking dives, and often do book them for minor "jersey tugging," something I don't always understand, in the light that players blatantly put their arms around opponents (in the penalty area nogals man) and don't get booked!

Handballs; major jersey grabbing-and-holding-on-for-dear-life; elbows in the face, arms-up headers in the area abound, and the refs do nothing to very little. Let alone the fact that honest players are often being disadvantaged by unscrupulous players and substandard refs.

Honestly, the consistency of refereeing decisions is poor, to say the least. FIFA needs to do something about it - and quick too, because it's becoming laughable and pathetic.

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