There is truly nothing more annoying when watch a football match then top see a ref who is so easily intimidated by one of he two teams and who fails to make the decisions that all the replays show should have been made.
Today, in the Norwich versus Leicester match we had the pleasure (that is a sarcastic comment) of Mr A Bates in the black, and for some reason we all thought he had been doing a good job for the first 25 minutes, then how we regretted thinking this.
The first clue that he had no idea what he was doing was when he insisted Norwich should stop play when a Leicester player was hobbling to wards the touchline with an injury to his leg. The referee's association made clear at the start of the year that there was no obligation on teams to kick the ball out of play for non serious injuries, and that the referee should only stop a game when there is a head injury or urgent medical need.
Then, within minutes, he missed a blatant hand ball in the area, a clear penalty Norwich should have had, but no. He failed to see it. Then he only gave a yellow card to the Leicester goalkeeper when he assaulted a Norwich player in an act of retaliation. All the replays at half time showed it to be a clear red card offence.
Just to show he really didn't have a clue, he then failed to give Norwich another penalty in the second half when the goalkeeper carried out a two footed lunge, the sort often punished in the premiership recently with instant red cards. The fact that this offence was in the area and the goalkeeper had already had a yellow card (and the lunge was on the same player he assaulted in the first half), seemed to be of no interest to the goalkeeper.
Mr Bates, Mister Bates ? Shameful.
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