

The Best of SAF Referee Rants (Officials avert your eyes)
By: Ryan | November 17th, 2009If you haven’t heard by now, Sir Alex Ferguson has received a 2 match ban (and a 20,000 pound fine) for comments made about Alan Wiley, the official for our 2-2 draw with Sunderland. Sir Alex may have implied that Wiley was “fat”, simply by stating that he was not “fit” to officiate the match.
Now we all know that officiating is a very hard job. And we also are all aware that Sir Alex expects nothing but the best, from his players and the officials, and in case you were not aware, he is also not afraid to make his displeasure public. Of course this is not the first instance where SAF has been in hot water with the referees union, so let’s look at 11 of his best rants, in no particular order:
** : Indicates SAF received some sort of match ban for his comments.
- Martin Atkinson (November 8th, 2009: Chelsea 1-0 United)
- Mark Halsey (November 28, 2002: United 1-2 Sunderland)
- Alan Wiley (October 6, 2009: United 2-2 Sunderland) **
- Steve Bennett (January 14, 2003: United 1-3 Manchester City)
- Howard Webb (November 3, 2007: United 2-2 Arsenal)
- Peter Walton (April 22, 2009: United 2-0 Portsmouth)
- Chris Foy (August 9, 2008:United 2-2 Chelsea)
- Mark Clattenburg (November 28, 2008: United 0-1 Bolton) **
- Andre Marriner (October 25, 2009: United 0-2 Liverpool)
- Mike Dean (November 18, 2008: United 4-3 Hull City) **
- Phil Dowd (April 20, 2005: United 0-1 Everton)
“The referee’s position to make a decision there was absolutely ridiculous. He can’t see it … It was a bad decision, but what can you do? You lose faith in the refereeing sometimes. That’s the way the players are talking in there. It was a bad one. That goal should not have been allowed.”
“A more capable referee would not have sent Dwight [Yorke] off, realising the type of player he is”
“He didn’t add on any time for the goal. He played four minutes and two seconds. He was also walking up the pitch for the second goal needing a rest. He was not fit enough for a game of that standard. He was taking 30 seconds to book a player. He was needing a rest. It was ridiculous”
“The referee’s decided it’s a red card and I think he should look at it again really. He [Cristiano Ronaldo] has not touched the player, he’s not got near him”
“I think Howard Webb has a great chance to be the top referee but today was a big game for him and, at times, he favoured Arsenal. Their second goal came from him not giving a free-kick for a foul on Louis Saha on the far side. It should have been a foul for us”
“That’s the disappointment because they [John O’Shea and Gary Neville] were both injured by bad tackles and the referee did nothing aboout it. I’m disappointed in that because you normally expect a really firm display from Peter Walton but not tonight”
“[Michael Ballack] elbowed him [Patrice Evra] clearly. The referee’s in line and had a clear view so Ballack’s lucky. But he’s made a rod for his own back. He’d stopped the game twice already. The referee didn’t get it right today. You have to be consistent and he blew twice but not the third time”
“Some referees don’t like it. They don’t like the truth but I just told him how bad he was in the first half”
“It is a very difficult atmospher here [at Anfield]. There was a wounded animal aspect to the game and it affected the referee. Whether he had enough experience or not, I don’t know”
“It should have been at least a yellow card, in which case the player would have been sent off. It made a difference”
“Paul Scholes was sent off for a late challenge. How many late challenges were there in that game from Everton players? It was amazing. Everton knew it was a weak referee and they exploited that to the full. I don’t blame them. Right from the first whistle, there was no protection”
Now even though most of these comments stem from a loss (which honestly, it would be really weird if the ratio wasn’t in that manner) SAF is statistically equal on the critiques regardless of the outcome of the game (I did a…Z-Test?…Yea that sounds right. Take my word for it). While I in no way support the lambasting of officials, at least SAF is a non-prejudicial ranter. If a referee makes a call that Sir Alex does not agree with, expect to hear it from him first hand.

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Comments | Add your comment
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And that’s why I don’t like him. It’s hard to do your job as a referee enough, much less when someone of his stature is constantly calling your competency into question.
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Haha nice article. (And who knew a Z-Test would ever enter into my life again after statistics???)
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love it. don’t care. it normally ends up working out for us in terms of him building an us against the world mentality and he normally has players that buy into that. it works. i don’t think it makes the referees act any differently. they’re fine at their jobs most of the time. it works for us on alot of levels though
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How is it that some people still fail to see that most of the time Fergie is bantering on about the ref, it is just a tactic to deflect criticism from players and himself.
It’s brilliant managing.
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I agree with Colin. A lot of the times when SAF makes a comment about the ref it is after a game when the players didn’t play up to the level they should have. With that said I don’t agree with critizing the ref in the media after a game.
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tomato, to-mah-to; “brilliant managing,” being an insufferable jerk…
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Mostly, I’m in agreement with Morpheus and Colin. Yeah it is a managerial tactic, but there are times where SAF might be in err. Critiquing and questioning a decision during the game is one thing, publicly humiliating after the fact(while it provides great stories for me) might be a little too much.
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He’s a jerk and if I was a Referee in the EPL and they weren’t taking action against SAF I wouldn’t feel very supported.
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Only Sir Alex can get away with his rants!
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United States

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