Pundits and managers must change the way we talk about referees to end football’s culture of disrespect

The vicious attack by Ankaragucu president Faruk Koca on Turkish referee Halil Umut Meler was not a one-off. Abuse is rife in football and it starts with how we talk about the game

In unsurprising news, the Turkish football club president who punched referee Halil Umut Meler in the face on Monday night has taken no responsibility for his actions. “This incident developed due to the wrong decisions and provocative behaviour of the referee,” explained Faruk Koca. Presumably, the “a” is silent.

Koca, who runs Super Lig club Ankaragucu, said he was merely planning to spit in the referee’s face after the 1-1 draw with Rizespor when impulse took hold. “I slapped the referee … After my slap, the referee threw himself on the ground. They immediately removed me from the scene because I have a heart condition.”

Meler is in hospital with a fractured cheekbone after he was punched and then kicked in the head while lying on the floor. Fortunately, doctors have reported no brain damage and he is expected to make a full recovery. Turkish football has been stopped and Koca has been arrested along with two other attackers. The Turkish justice system must come down hard with life bans from sport and criminal sentences, though Koca is a well-connected businessman and former politician, so we shall see.

Turkish club president Faruk Koca punches referee Halil Umut Meler (Anadolu/Getty)

A melee erupts as Meler is attacked (Reuters)

The risk here is that this is painted as a freak incident, as something that happened in another place, and therefore happens in another place. The reality is that abuse is endemic within every part of football, and we don’t need to look far to find frequent examples. Only this weekend, a 14-year-old British referee – who wears a yellow armband to signal he is a child – had to abandon a game due to the threats he was receiving from an adult. He is now preparing for an FA disciplinary hearing into the incident.

Football has a long-term problem with the denigration of officials but recently, a mistrust of the people running the sport has grown deeper and darker. The flaws of VAR have added fuel to the fire of conspiracy theorists like the former England goalkeeper Ben Foster. He recently used his popular podcast in a conversation with fellow non-investigative journalist Mark Goldbridge to claim that the Premier League is involved in a cover-up with Sky Sports to hide refereeing mistakes (it is actually the opposite – each VAR farce is good content for Sky and a hit for their social media metrics. They go to town for about 48 hours on Sky Sports News).

Such theories feed into the broader suspicion of officials, and that suspicion feeds football’s culture of disrespect. And here’s the thing; it is possible to change the culture. Some things have already changed. Fifteen years ago, it was not uncommon for a footballer – Wayne Rooney comes to mind but there were many – to swear generously into the stoic face of a referee. That player might, if they were unlucky, pick up a yellow card, but more often than not it was an accepted occupational hazard by referees who occasionally gave some stick back.

Wayne Rooney discusses the finer points of the game with Howard Webb (Getty)

The landscape has shifted with the FA’s various respect campaigns and a strengthening of the rules which has emboldened today’s referees to punish players for abuse. Last month, for the first time in more than a decade, a Premier League player was shown a straight red card for swearing at an official when Brighton captain Lewis Dunk launched a verbal tirade at referee Anthony Taylor.

But while the culture has shifted a little on the pitch, it remains deeply poisoned off it. Afterwards, Dunk’s manager Roberto De Zerbi said: “I don’t like 80 per cent of England’s referees. It’s not new. I don’t like them. I don’t like their behaviour on the pitch.” Arsenal’s Mikel Arteta and Chelsea’s Mauricio Pochettino have both been scathing of referees this season, like many managers before them.

Managers have a greater influence than they know. Taylor and his family were hounded by Roma fans at Budapest airport after he refereed their Europa League final defeat, an incident which came hours after Roma’s manager Jose Mourinho had confronted and swore at Taylor in the stadium car park. It was like something from the Trumpian playbook, a beaten leader playing on the emotions of their followers and showing them where to direct their rage. And Mourinho still denies the result.

Jose Mourinho was furious with Anthony Taylor in the Europa League final (PA)

In the studios, pundits continue to berate referees on radio and television shows to audiences of millions, often prefacing their pre-planned speech with “I don’t like talking about referees but”, as if their hands are tied and they are duty-bound to serve a vocal fringe on social media. Jermaine Jenas, who was part of the FA’s “Love Football, Protect the Game” campaign ahead of the new season, tweeted that referee Robert Jones was a “complete s***house” to his 280,000 followers during September’s north London derby. That kind of public statement would be career-damaging in many professional spaces but in football, aimed at referees, it is not. We are desensitised to their abuse. Jenas has just been given a new gig as the frontman for Formula E.

Jenas’s tweet was labelled “disgraceful” by Ref Support UK, a charity which really shouldn’t need to exist. It carries a dedicated advice and support hotline, and among its other tools is a professional counsellor who offers free sessions to referees under the slogan: “You no longer have to struggle in silence.” It estimates at least four physical assaults on officials every week by players, coaches, fans or parents. Registered referees have fallen from over 30,000 to around 20,000 in just a few years as they flee the job, and the charity describes them as “an endangered species”.

But they can be saved if we change how we talk about the game. Cricket might feel like another world, without football’s emotive tribalism, but it sets one example to follow, where analysis of poor umpire calls focuses on the decision-making process rather than the person doing the decision-making. In football, post-match interviewers could decide not to chase a manager’s angry soundbite about decisions, and studio pundits could avoid the bait of talking about them.

This kind of measured conversation isn’t hard, with a little collective will. When the discourse changes, the culture will change with it. Because the alternative is that nothing changes. Turkish football will soon restart, Meler’s wounds will heal, Koca will be forgotten. Until the next one.