Sunderland Welcome Head of Referee Development in April

Neale Barry will focus on the retention and development of referees between County level and the professional game. He will not continue in his career as a Premier League referee.

Promoted to The FA Premier League referees list in 1997, he has officiated 155 Premiership matches.

In total, Neale has taken charge of over 400 matches as a National List referee over the course of 12 seasons. He was also appointed as a match official at 26 matches overseas, and brings to the post 15 years’ experience in referee training and education.

Tags: Guest Speaker, Neale Barry

International Rugby ref speaks in March

Northumberland Society ref Dave Pearson has an old job to thank for his decision to take up the whistle. Time spent abroad whilst working for Proctor and Gamble as a Chemical Engineer left Pearson unable to train regularly with his club Seghill. So when a youth team needed someone to take charge, he stepped forward and says he never looked back.

That was back in 1992 and since then he has joined the RFU National Panel (1997) and refereed his first full Premiership match when he took control of NEC Harlequins v London Irish in 2000, having previously stepped in for Brian Campsall during Rotherham’s match against Sale.

Since going full time in 2002 he has gone on to referee seven internationals, the first being in April 2005 between Argentina and Japan. One of his career highlights came from the shortened game, at the 2003 Hong Kong Sevens. His Six Nations debut followed, in February 2006 and later that year he went on to take charge of his first ever Premiership Final.

An accomplished golfer, he plays off a handicap of seven and also enjoys cooking for wife Paulene.

Tags: Guest Speaker, Dave Pearson

Sunderland society played hosts for the FA organised respect presentation in January.

Every qualified referee has to attend one of the arranged presentations within the coming months.

Alan Wilkie a former premier league referee and now regional referee development officer took the presentaion in front of a group of 60-70 referees from the Sunderland area.

Alan spoke in length of how the referee respect programme has been working since its introduction at the start of season 2008/09 and outlined the FA’s intentions on how to further improve the problems involving a lack of respect towards the referee from players , managers & supporters.

There was a good points & questions asked from the floor and the debate certainly started to heat up when one of our members suggested that the respect programme should start at the very top of the football tree the Premier league & not grass roots football as it currently is , our premier league stars who earn millions of pounds a year should be setting the example to the rest of football , a point that the majority of the audience agreed with entirely.

The meeting has started with a presentation to our society for our 100 year centenary.

Alan Wilkie presented a plaque on behalf of the FA & Roly Croysdale presented a block and gavel on behalf of the Referees Association.

Tags: Respect, FA Referee

Sunderland Referees welcome Ian Blanchard as guest speaker to Februarys meeting

On the 1st September 2005, I became the Head of National Referee Development at the FA. I now have responsibility for the recruitment, retention and development of all referees involved in the National game through to Supply League level. I also manage the seven Regional Referees Managers.”

Mr. Blanchard’s Portfolio:
• 1988: First refereeing experience in the East Riding of Yorkshire.
• 1989: Promoted to Class 1 or Level 5.
• 1989: Promoted to Northern Premier League Assistant referees List.
• 1990: Promoted to Referee on Northern Premier League.
• 1991: Promoted onto the National List of assistant referees.
• 1992: Promoted onto the Premier League as an Assistant referee.
• 1994: Qualified as a FA Licensed referee Instructor.
• 1999: Joined FA Staff as a Group Instructor on the National Course.
• 2000: Joined FA Staff on the International Referee Instructor Course.
• 2001: Employed as a FA Regional Manager.

Mr. Blanchard made 5 visits to Wembley to officiate in the following memorable games:
• 1995: FA Vase Final Oxford City v Ardsley Utd.
• 1996: FL Div 1 Play Off Final – Crystal Palace v Leicester City.
• 1998: Div 2 Play Off Final – Man City v Gillingham.
• 1999: FA Trophy Final – Southport v Cheltenham.
• 2000 FL Div 1 Play Off Final – Barnsley v Ipswich Town.

Tags: Guest Speaker, Ian Blanchard

Howard Webb alongside Malcolm Langley at the recent Bishop Auckland referees meeting

On Thursday 20th November I was lucky enough, along with fellow Sunderland RA members Graeme Fyvie and Shaun Hudson, to be amongst a packed Bishop Auckland Cricket Club to here a most informative talk by FIFA Referee Howard Webb at the Bishop Auckland RA meeting.

Howard talked openly about his career and used a really informative presentation about him refereeing in Euro 2008 and the problems that enused after he awarded a last minute penalty (It was a Stonewall Bang On Pen in my opinion) to Austria with Poland leading 1-0.
 
It was a great night all round and Howard was only too pleased to talk to young and older referees alike afterwards.  Howard had only arrived back at Heathrow Airport that morning after refereeing Greece v Italy the night before. 
 
What A Gentelman he is,
Cheers
Malcolm Langley

Tags: Bishop Aukland Referees Association

(left to right: Billy Khatib, David Webb and Geoff Eltringham)

Sunderland society was finally pleased to welcome David Webb to Rutland Street , two months later than planned.

Our society was also pleased to welcome along members of the Sunderland AFC veterans supporters club to our meeting who were joined by a healthy number of our own members.

David has made an excellent start to his first year as a football league referee having served one year on the list as a football league assistant.

Located in Stanley County Durham David started refereeing just over 10 years ago , officiating regular in the Consett Sunday league along with running the line in the Wearside league , it didn't take long for the refereeing bug to start to bite and Dave quickly worked his way up the refereeing ladder , the Wearside league was followed by the Northern league (contrib) and then onto the list as a football conference referee where he had the delight of officiating at wembley on the Football conference play off final , along with acting as a football league assistant referee.

After an excellent 1st season on the conference David was given the chance to join the list of football league referees , and he has grabbed the opportunity with both hands achieving good reports from both clubs and assessors and was recently appointed to referee the Victory shield international between England & Scotland at Lincoln City’s Sincel Bank , a game which was shown live on Sky Sports.

In early 2009 Dave will be England’s representative at the prestige’s Dallas Cup international youth tournament which includes teams like Real Madrid , Barcelona , AC Milan & Manchester United which speaks volumes for how Dave is regarded in the refereeing circuit.

David started the meeting with a brief insight on how he got started becoming a referee along with his early highs & lows , with the aid of the projector & DVD he then went into discuss his early impressions & experiences as a football league referee.

The floor were shown various clips of Daves games and which provided alot of good talking points , there was a lot of positive practice which i'm sure our members could introduce into there games along with certain things David would have done different in other games.

What was refreshing was that although David has risen to the top of the refereeing ladder very quickly , he has remained the same level headed , down to earth person that alot of our members remember working with on the Wearside and Northern league, and i'm sure when David continues his quest to the top he won't let success go to his head and will still have time for the people who helped him achieve his goal.

After his presentation which lasted just over an hour David took time to answer questions and interact with our members whilst enjoying the buffet which was well received by all in attendance.

Sunderland Referees Society would like to wish David Webb all the best in what I'm sure will be a long and successful career.


David Webb (bottom centre) along with Geoff Eltringham at this years USA Cup

Tags: Event, Guest Speaker, David Webb

Sunderland society welcomed Micheal Oliver back to Rutland Street for his second visit as guest speaker however this time he wasn’t supported by his father and fellow football league referee Clive!



From left to right - Shaun Hudson, Kieran Mersh, Paul Younger, Michael Oliver, LLoyd Thompson, Chris porter, Gary Jackson, James Simpson

Michael is the youngest football league referee on the national list and is currently enjoying his second season in the middle, and judging by the profile of games & the excellent start Michael has made to the season it would come as no surprise to anyone if this was to be his last season refereeing in the football league before making the inevitable step up to the premier league.

The 23 year old has already been involved in a number of high profile games in his short career including playoff finals as an assistant referee & refereeing the football conference playoff final at Wembley at the end of the 2005-06 season.

This season hasn’t exactly been low profile, with Michael refereeing games such as Derby County Vs Birmingham City, Liverpool Vs Crewe and a live Monday night sky game between Nott’s County and Brentford which we will refer to later!!!

Michael was given a blank canvas with no subject being set to talk about , so after a 10 -15 minute talk on how he got started in refereeing and how he progressed rapidly up the refereeing ladder , Michael chose to talk to the floor about the teamwork involved between the referee , assistant referees & 4th official.

The talk was supported with Michaels own experiences in this area , in particular a live Sky T.V. game between Nott’s County and Brentford only a few weeks ago , where both the assistant referee & Michael had different opinions on a penalty incident.


Guest speaker Michael Oliver being presented with a memento from Dave Morton

After watching the T.V. footage several times Michael opened the discussion to the floor , what was refreshing was the fact that Michael didn’t try and insist his decision was the correct one , he simply asked the members what they thought , the feed back was good with some very good points & views being exchanged.

A good question and answer session followed, again it was good to see our younger members playing an active part in discussions.

All that was left of the evening was for us to witness Michaels beloved Newcastle United concede a late equaliser at the hands of Manchester City , what a shame!!!

For the second month in row Sunderland society has been treated to an excellent guest speaker , it was good to see the experienced Nigel Miller come and talk in September and with a future starlet like Michael speaking this month our society certainly looks to be heading in the right direction.

Tags: Event, Guest Speaker, Michael Oliver

Sunderland Society were delighted to welcome back experienced football league referee Nigel Miller to speak at our September meeting.



Nigel stepped in at very short notice due to our scheduled guest speaker Dave Webb having to withdraw due to work commitments.

Nigel has been a Football league referee for the last six year during which time he has officiated in a lot of high profile games including football league playoffs and passionate local derbies.

Nigel first made his name as a Football league then later a Premier league assistant referee , and his role of honour is endless , officiating in Playoff games , Premier league title deciders , Carling Cup semi finals but without doubt the most impressive string in his bow is officiating in the 2003 FA cup final.

A good Sunderland turn out greeted Nigel as he arrived at the Rutland Street RAOB club , where Nigel spoke in great depth about how he got started in Refereeing and how he progressed up the refereeing ladder starting out in Sunday morning football and working his way up through the Wearside & Northern Leagues taking some knocks and setbacks along the way.

Then with use of the societies high tech VCR and projector!! Nigel played a number of clips of his own games , making us aware of a lot of refereeing good practice but surprisingly even more bad practice which was very refreshing to hear a referee admit when he has cocked up and admit to mistakes which we all make on a regular basis.

Nigel ended his presentation with a good question & answer session in which a lot of our younger members had an active part in , if it wasn’t for the hot buffet getting cold I’m sure Nigel would have been more than happy to continue all night.

I’m sure everyone who was in attendance on the night , including 4 new members & a couple of older members who were rejoining our society , enjoyed the full content of the night and with more quality guest speakers programmed for the months to come the future looks bright for our society.



Don’t forget to subscribe to the RSS Feed to get news updates delivered to you as they happen!

Tags: Nigel Miller, FA Referee, Guest Speaker, Meeting

Sunderland Referees Association will for the first time in their history open the doors to Football Leagues within the City.

The committee would like to extend an invitation for you and officials of your league too join us while we have these quality quest speakers.

This invitation is not to be missed, buffet provided (FREE).

Guest Speakers

Monday 15th Sep David Webb

( 1st year Football League Referee & Englands representative @ 2009 Dallas Cup)


Monday 20th Oct Michael Oliver

( Youngest Football League Referee ever!!! , refereed 2007 Conference Playoff Final & 2008 Nordvic Cup final)


Monday 17th Nov Dave Pearson

( Experienced International Rugby Referee)


Monday 15th Dec ***Xmas event***
( Social gathering everyone welcome )


Monday 19th Jan
( 100 year centenary presentation)


Monday 16th Feb Neale Barry

( Former Premier League Referee & current FA head of Refereeing)


Monday 16th Mar Nigel Miller

( Experienced Football League Referee & 2003 FA Cup final official )

Venue
Sir John Short RAOB Club,
Rutland Street,
Sunderland

Please confirm numbers to :-

Bill Black - Geoff Eltringham - Ken Barker

Tags: Event