Abuse of referees will not be tolerated, says Soccer Nova Scotia

The executive director of Soccer Nova Scotia says a troubling trend is emerging.

Brad Lawlor says the sport is seeing a sharp increase in verbal, and sometimes even physical abuse of its referees.

“The insults go from anywhere from cursing and calling names, to calling referees cheaters and liars,” he said. “It could be talking about threatening them.”

“We did have one incident of physical abuse where a player decided to two-hand push a referee down to the ground.”

Referees can range in age from their teens to retirees, and Lawlor said every one of them deserves a safe workplace free from insults and abuse.

With the sport gaining in popularity, it's already struggling to find enough officials to cover off the heightened demand, but the situation is going to get much worse if the current refs decide to hang up their whistles.

“Retention levels for referees in sport, especially soccer, are about 50 per cent at best,” he explained. “So we have 150 or 160 first-year referees out of 390 coming back into the system, and people are expecting them to know all the rules.”

He said it's difficult to build a team of experience officials if they don't want to stick around for future seasons.

“We have a referee of 30 years that has said he will not come back because of the amount of abuse he got during a game,” Lawlor said. “That should just not be happening.”

He knows it's been a challenging time for everyone, but said this abuse is unacceptable and it will not be tolerated.

Coaches, fans and players can already be suspended for this type of behaviour, and in some cases, charges could be warranted.

But Soccer Nova Scotia is working on coming up with stricter penalties, along with creating more awareness about the issue.

“I want to make sure that anyone connected to our game feels comfortable being involved in our game,” Lawlor stated, adding everyone can play a role in shifting the culture away from this abuse.

“We have a lot of fantastic coaches and a lot of fantastic parents … I don't want to paint everyone with the same brush,” he added. “But when those parents and coaches see this, please call it out and let them know it's not acceptable.”