The slow, painful decline of grassroots football told through the eyes of an 81-year-old referee who refuses to retire

Veteran whistler Bill Collinson speaks to Simon Hughes, even handing him the linesman's flag, about refereeing, the non-league game and the city of Liverpool's relationship with the Premier League

Bill Collinson is still refereeing into his 80s (Simon Hughes/The Independent)

It was Saturday afternoon and the cars on Queens Drive heading towards Walton were stationary.

In an indirect way, the traffic laid bare the imbalance that exists in an era where attentions on the Premier League and nearby stadiums like Goodison Park mean amateur fixtures such as the one taking place down the road in Childwall kick off late due to the number of players unable to arrive on time. They subsequently finish early, partly because of winter’s darkness falling on Merseyside.

It was also a reality that BRNESC were 9-0 up on Abbey by 3.25pm, the moment Bill Collinson blew his whistle for the final time, putting the Abbey players out of their misery following a contest where they were unable to name substitutes or, indeed, have any person representing them on the touchline other than the left-back’s young daughter who’d “rather have been at gymnastics.” The factor resulted in Collinson handing me the flag and with that, The Independent made its debut as a referee’s assistant in the Zingari Over-35s League.

When an Abbey defender strained his hamstring mid-way through the first half, a civic-minded BRNESC centre forward – who’d already swept in the game’s outstanding goal – offered to switch sides in his attempt to even the encounter up a bit, though it did not work, as BRNESC kept scoring.

Their team had been led by Martin Crowder wearing the number three shirt but playing up-front, a one-time left back that had played in the same Everton youth set-up as Wayne Rooney. Meanwhile, Abbey’s midfield included 39-year-old Adriano Rigoglioso, who was a junior with Steven Gerrard at Liverpool before proving himself in the Football League with Morecambe and Doncaster Rovers where he was roundly referred to by his family nickname of Celi, after the Italian popstar Adriano Celentano, who he supposedly resembled.

“Daz…” Rigoglioso had shouted down the phone near muddy walls of the damp changing rooms ten minutes before play was about to start, hoping to reach Abbey’s tardy goalkeeper. “Darren, we’ll wait for yer, kid…”

Everton versus Cardiff City meant the referee reached Childwall later than he’d like to have done as well. He’d travelled on his moped. “We’ve only got nine at the moment, ref,” Rigoglioso told Collinson, putting his arm around the official’s shoulder.

Though it may have been received as an attempt to buy more time, the affection from Rigoglioso towards Collinson was warm. The referee is well known across Liverpool. Aged eighty-one, he had taken charge of more than 3,000 games across 57 seasons in the Merseyside amateur leagues, though his first match had been in 1959 when he lived in Bridgnorth having moved there to work for electronics firm, Plessey’s.

Collinson’s story seemed an important one to tell. His active presence in refereeing circles proves that passion remains for amateur football in Liverpool, though he was also probably better placed than anyone because of his longevity to speak about how football has changed over the decades and whether, indeed, it is changing for the better. As a working class man who loves the game, his voice would carry weight.

A couple of days after BRNESC’s dismantling of Abbey, I met him again at his home in Aigburth. He began by asking me a question relating to my previous experience working as a linesman. When it was established that I had none, he offered a withering assessment of my efforts. “You were late with the flag and I ignored you,” he said, wheezing with laughter. “The play had moved on half a mile away and you were trying to bring it back, you bloody clown – and make sure that goes in your writing!”

BRNESC in action on a cold November day in Liverpool (Simon Hughes/The Independent)

Collinson used to go running six nights a week and this helped him complete 51 marathons. He has beaten bowel cancer and continued to referee while he was having treatment. His commitment was marked by the Liverpool County Football Association at a dinner in September where he was handed a plaque. He seemed embarrassed when I suggested he might be the longest serving referee in the country. “I don’t know and I don’t care – it’s just been an honour to do it. It’s irrelevant to me because I still feel like a young kid.”

A measure of his endurance is illustrated by the fact that his first game in Bridgnorth came before Bill Shankly was appointed as manager of Liverpool, the club he supports. “I played for a team and used to moan at referees a lot,” he admitted. “One day, this ref comes over and says, ‘Why don’t you have a go if you think you know your stuff…’

“At 81, it’s very easy to slip into nostalgia when comparing the old with the new. But I do think less people then were money motivated. It’s a nice little earner refereeing now if you put the hours in even at amateur level. It’s £30 pound a game and some referees do three a day at a weekend. It’s £90 for four or five hours work. I don’t need the money. I’ve got no overheads. The house is paid for. I’ve got no debts. I do it because I enjoy it. I’ll do it until I die.

“I enjoy the craic because I can get away with murder. On Saturday, the goalie for BRNESC wasn’t happy when I gave a penalty against him and he was having a right old moan but I always stick with my decisions when they’ve been made. If you’re indecisive, the players will smell you like a rat.

“The goalie was later substituted. When he took his shirt off in front of everybody, I said to his captain, ‘He’s a fatty isn’t he?’ The captain started laughing and then shouted what I’d said to all of his mates on the touchline. They were all laughing too. We were all laughing!”

Collinson says he operates from the centre circle because he recognises his limitations and his legs won’t take him as far as they used to but he thinks this has improved the viewing positions he picks and therefore has actually sharpened his judgement. “If someone gives it a big boot down the middle you’ve got no chance of chasing after it, haven’t you? So you’ve got to be smart.”

He also wears a hearing aid in his right ear, though this can sometimes be an advantage. “I hear what I want to hear! Not so long ago, sent one fella off; he was a narky little so-and-so but nothing I couldn’t handle. I called me something and I turned around quickly, telling him ‘That’s my good side…off you pop’ because he’d already been booked. I don’t mind a bit of swearing normally. The players are human beings, they’re passionate and they’ve got to be able to express themselves. I say a lot back to them. You’ve got to have your own personality.”

“Refereeing is like an apprenticeship, you never stop learning even when you’ve passed your badges,” he continued. “It’s harder for the young ones in this country now because of the pressure they’re under. You need a backbone, you’ve got to have a passion for it and you need to accept that you’re not going to get everything right all of the time, that there’ll be a few knocks along the way. You can take all the exams you want and get all the mentoring you might need but the only way you learn is through your own decisions.”

He wonders whether VAR will take the professional game even further away from the amateur game than it already is. While veterans football has proven popular in Liverpool the traditional Saturday and Sunday leagues have reduced considerably since the heyday of the 1970s “when everybody seemed to be playing football.”

“The Liverpool Sunday league used to have 12 divisions, now it’s got two,” Collinson explained ruefully. “The pitches aren’t well maintained and the cost of using them are high. The solution has been to turn to 3G pitches but I don’t think veteran players like those as much because they have an impact on knees. There’s no give in the ground. Last season, I only did about ten games because of the state of the pitches and games getting called off. The council is under a lot of pressure in terms of what they spend and where they give it so I’ve got some sympathy with them. I’ve got sympathy with the players that choose not to play as well because a lot of them have to work at weekends to pay the bills.”

For Collinson, football has always been an amateur game. He stopped going to at Anfield at some point in the 1970s when there was a price hike and suddenly, match tickets cost a pound. “The Premier League doesn’t do a lot for me, it’s more of a show than a sport,” he concluded. “The businessmen took control long ago and the Scudamore thing doesn’t surprise me one jot.”

It is the Merseyside derby on Sunday of course, but Collinson only plans to watch the highlights. At midday, he will be overseeing what sounds like a rather more serious matter of Empress Lettings Athletic against Childwall Athletic at Thomas Lane, near Ken Dodd’s home in Knotty Ash. “The big game of the weekend,” he relished calling it.