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Message: [QUOTE="Chuck, post: 1834075, member: 1646"] Parents and coaches can be [word that would be filtered]. I should know, I play both roles! In general, I've only had two issues with refs that went beyond "you missed that one!" Both involved refs that didn't understand the age group they were dealing with and had Napoleonic complex. One would only use hand signals for calls in a Girls U9 game. The girls on both teams were confused and he yelled at them "if you don't know the hand signals, maybe you should be playing rec!" thing on so many levels (intimidating and demeaning the girls, insulting rec.) We had it out and the opposing coach calmed me down and said they've asked never to have him as a ref again. The other threatened to give our U11 boys yellow cards (the whole team) because they said "no more goals" to each other when we went up 7 (we get fined if we win by more than 7 and we were already playing a man down to even things up). She felt that saying "no more goals" was unsportsmanlike and said our kids needed to be taught a lesson. I asked her if they needed to be taught secret words or hand signals to communicate. A few other humorous (or not) ref stories: [LIST] [*]My assistant coach for U9 Girls was a football player growing up. He knew very little about soccer. He didn't understand the nuances of offsides. At least three times he yelled "offsides" at the ref. Each time I explained to him why it wasn't offsides. On the fourth time the ref came running over and yelled "do you even know what offsides is!" The assistant took his medicine and said "actually, my coach has told me that I don't, and I promise to shut up." [*]The same assistant, in a great close game, yelled at his daughter to "get your a__ moving!" The ref stopped the game and started pulling out a yellow for me. I explained that it was my assistant and that was only motivating his own daughter. He agreed to hold the card but threatened to go red if he heard anything again. [*]The other one seems funny now, but wasn't at the time. We played the U8 team of an academy with nationally ranked teams. Their U8 players were destroying everyone at a tournament. We were hanging with them so they started playing a lot harder. They were slide tackling which wasn't allowed in our league. Our 7 year olds were falling all over the field. To be clear, the slide tackles were generally clean. Our coach calmly asked the ref at least 5 times if slide tackling was allowed. He said no, but he didn't see any slide tackles. He was clearly intimidated by the other team's uniforms. In the second half, tied 3-3 our star player had a breakaway. He got tackled from behind and went down crying. He slapped the ball away from his head while he was on the ground. The ref blew the whistle and called him for a hand ball. Our kids mom was a hothead and she ran on the field to yell at the ref. Two of our dads went on the field to pull her away. Three of the other team's parents ran on the field to protect their kids. The other coach pulled the team off the field. My son still claims they forfeited and he won. In the end, our parents were at fault (they aren't with the team anymore), but the ref let it get to a breaking point. [/LIST] [/QUOTE]

Verification: First name of men's bb coach