Via Mirror
Every weekend, at least one animated manager or incandescent player is spotted confronting a referee in the Premier League.
it's safe to assume those conversations are not friendly. That is the perception at grassroots level, where amateur coaches and players - including youngsters - are mimicking Premier League stars by hurling abuse at officials.
Greg Cruttwell: "It's so difficult for young refs coming into the game
"So many of them come in in their teenage years and give it up before they really get going - some who could be fantastic - because they take horrific abuse from people twice or three times their age ganging up on them on Sunday mornings."
If you ask any of the refs in In The Middle what they would say to any young ref coming in to the game, they would say, 'You need a thick skin and you need to be tough and strong mentally because there’s going to be a lot of s*** thrown at you, and you’ve got to be able to come through that'.
"It’s just so sad that it’s like that and, generally, people aren’t more supportive. They [the Football Association] brought in the Respect campaign back in 2008... and it’s hardly made any difference at all. You still see most of the same appalling behaviour from people if you go to any youth team or age-group games on a Saturday and Sunday."
Cruttwell has urged those at the top of the English game to improve their behaviour towards referees.
The likes of Mikel Arteta and Jurgen Klopp have faced criticism for their behaviour on the touchline.
The Liverpool manager has even claimed talking to a referee is like talking to "my microwave". "You get no response really," said Klopp.
Cruttwell: "If you look at the way Premier League managers, and the top managers, treat referees, as opposed to how they do in rugby, where they have no interaction with them at all,"
"When you’ve got Klopp and the others all yelling and hurling abuse at referees and [Jose] Mourinho [doing the same] and whatever, it’s obviously all repeated behaviour.
"That gets repeated by coaches all the way down in grassroots football. It gets repeated by parents and players, who think they can gather around refs and touch them… referees just get a really hard time. It’s no wonder the numbers of them are dwindling.
"Unless there’s a massive change, it’ll always be around. It needs a draconian approach. I think referees need to walk onto the pitch and they only deal with the captain... if any other players come around them or talk to them or touch them, they immediately get a yellow card.
"The moment you start doing that - it’s not going to take very long - teams and players are going to stop doing it because they won’t want to pick up yellow and red cards."
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