Sri Lanka vs Maldives, Friendly Football at Male Stadium
Sri Lanka held Maldives 0-0
19-Dec-2004

Asian Football Confederation Director of Referee Gary Power will conduct a refereeing course on 20th December, 2004 at Football House.

The job of the referees has often been undermined, few on the terraces and behind the screens failing to realize the difficulties involved in controlling a volatile contest between 22 players.

The Asian Football Confederation’s (AFC) referring department recognizes the need to improve the officiating standards and courses that are already in place, the new directives swerved from the positives and negatives witnessed at the recently concluded 2004 Asian Cup Finals.

The Director of the AFC Referee Department, Mr Gary Power, has inducted a comprehensive 12-year course to ensure Asian officials will be given the right route to improve their game through the course of their careers. From application of the Laws of the Game to positioning to player management and situation management, plenty of thought had gone through during the preparation programs.
In order to help the referees maximise their performances, the courses will soon be tweaked, no matter what level of competitions the officials are engaged in.

The courses will represent a progression in the style, content and approach to the education of the referees. The programs utilises effective education modules to develop and explain modern referee theories, stressing to the officials that the development of officiating standards engulf more than just a good knowledge of the Laws of the Game. Ultimately, those development principles must be planned - tailor made at all levels and should run sequentially in order for the referees to improve.

According to Mr. Power, the curriculum must primarily, focus on the improvement of performance. In a nutshell, the Curriculum should only be used as a template to determine the priority areas for development, just so time, money and resources can be saved. If those objectives could be met, the chances of maximizing success would run at a very high level. The sequential progression necessitates a slow start that would gradually accelerate over time. Improvement can then be noticed after five years and if the referees continue to invest in improving their game, there is no reason why their careers can't progress in the long run.

"Sometimes people question the use of younger referees but I have no qualms about using young referees," said Mr. Power. "The key issue is competence, not age. "I would rather have a young referee makes the mistakes because of a lack of experience than have another referee make mistakes because of a lack of competence." Education is undoubtedly, the key to success of refereeing development programs. There are controllable factors in Referee Education, the performance-based curricula giving plenty of room for the current courses to be revamped.

Perceptibly, there are fundamental elements in the education of a referee. A complete re-look at the curriculum heads the wish list, with competent instructors following in close second. A good curriculum must be based on achieving improved performances backed up by infrastructure and financial resources. Instructors must be taught to deliver the curriculum in the most accurate manner and must also be trained to assess referees in relation to the curriculum.

Once there are established and famous referee names in the business, those officials will go on to serve as role models of football. Competition drives improvement and just like the players and coaches, referees would want to copy the behaviors of their successful counterparts.