"You don't know what you are doing"

[SussexYellow]

Does anybody else feel we are not helping our own cause by quickly jumping to this chant.

I am no psychologist but I can not see it is conducive to getting a ref to think oops I may have dropped a howler perhaps I should even it up a bit. 

For me the crowd should be vocal in venting there anger, booing at the time of the incident and then let it go. That is enough to let the ref know that several thousand people have seen it differently, enough to make him think on it.

 

[morty]

I shouldn't imagine the ref pays any attention. If a ref was psycologically affected by such things then it would be pretty obvious, and I doubt he would be reffing at the top level for much longer.

 

[the jarrold]

Yes I doubt that a ref would take much notice but maybe we could try singing 'Always Look on the Bright Side of Life'.

 

[It's Character Forming]

I think I read somewhere that research showed home advantage in football was to a great degree down to officials making decisions in favour of the home team, can't remember where tho (frustratingly) and no idea how they came to that conclusion.  Certainly you go to places like Stoke and they will howl at the ref even for decisions against them which are clearly correct, and if he makes a big decision against them, they won't let it rest. 

Personally IMO refs in the PL have a level of bias in favour of the bigger teams and they favour the home team only to a limited extent.  Also a difference between PL refs and lower level is that PL refs will make big decisions that alter games like giving penalties, sending people off and disallowing goals.  They like to be centre of attention.  Lower league refs are less confident and so are more likely to not make a decision and let things go (which obviously can be equally bad if they miss a clear penalty).  The fact is that a ref tends to get criticised less if he doesn't do something than if he makes a decision that is wrong.

Saturday in my view was the ref bottling it in his first PL game.  He failed to make the call for the bad early tackle by the Palace player and then panicked, rabbit in headlights comes to mind.  Well, that or he was paid off, which I think is unlikely.

 

[The Great Mass Debater]

Saturday in my view was the ref bottling it in his first PL game.  

Not sure Id agree with that. Im not sure where the decision to disallow the Jerome goal came from - obviously the ref has endorsed it, but was he deferring to the linesman for instance. Mark Halsey said in his blog on Simon Hooper about him 'going looking for trouble' and he has certainly done this by disallowing the goal. This went against the grain, as in only one Palace player appealed, the Norwich players and the majority of the stadium were celebrating. Disallowing the goal was something he went out of his way to do, knowing it would outrage and upset the majority of people there. You cant really say thats him bottling it. Its not a weak decision - he's not bowed to pressure. Its just a very bad decision. Its hard to understand the motivation - Attention? Drama? Ego? But this is one of those things where he's made himself centre-stage and not the players. Perhaps he saw this game as his opportunity to impress. (I've recently seen 'Book of Mormon' and Im thinking of the 'Do something incredible' scene if anyones seen it, or failing that Bret's exposure to the Greetings Card guy in Flight of the Conchords...) Halsey said he was in charge of the League 2 Play-off final and was fast-tracked to the Premier League on a trial basis Im not sure if that means he's usually a League Two ref? Halsey criticized his selection ahead o the game. Maybe he was simply trying to make a name for himself. Not sending off Murray and not giving the penalty were probably him bottling big decisions - but he's gone out of his way to disawllow the Jerome goal, which really doesnt fit. Bizarre

 

[SussexYellow]

I shouldn't imagine the ref pays any attention. If a ref was psycologically affected by such things then it would be pretty obvious, and I doubt he would be reffing at the top level for much longer.

Well that's the theory but I wonder if it is the practice.

Not sure it would be that obvious that they were being influenced either way by strong negative criticism by the crowd.

The theory is also that Refs should not be affected by criticism from Sir Alex Ferguson, but was that really the case?

I think there are an elite group of a few top refs who the theory might apply to, below that the quality as we have found is variable.

 

[Moosheep]

Saturday was the first time I've seen both sets of fans chanting "you don't know what you're doing" simultaneously. That has to say something about the ref! 

As to the original question, last season Mark Clattenburg seemed to revel in his role as the villain, smiling and shaking his head towards the fans when he was the focus of their attentions. At thetime I  thought that it was a) very unprofessional of him and b} how we were doing ourselves no favours with this guy in charge.

Do refs deliberately make controversial decisions? I think not, but there is a lot of stuff going on in the sub-concious when we are making decisions and I am sure having 20,000 plus people focussing their negative emotions towards you will have some influence. What form that influence takes however is probably down to the individual, what kind of week they are having and whether they got two cups of coffee with breakfast that morning.

 

[eatonparkboy]

The chants are like nursery rhymes compared to nastiness of years ago. I don't recall any ref making a complaint then or now. Whether or not it is influential on their decision making or attitude to a club is I believe unlikely. The game has changed so much including players and crowd and because of that, I believe refereeing has changed. Of course Ferguson scared refs but he did so from a position of strength. I don't believe a nasty, grumpy AN would draw the same respect from a ref because of who he is manager of.