DURING the past few weeks I have been speaking with a work colleague about his teenage son and how he had been enjoying his first season with the umpiring fraternity.
His son is currently playing with the juniors at the Mildura Football Netball Club and wanted to do some boundary umpiring for a bit of extra fitness, to help his football and to earn a bit of pocket money.
Two weeks ago he made his senior boundary umpiring debut and loved every moment of being on the ground with the big boys.
The discussion made me start to think about the umpires I enjoyed having out on the oval when I was playing and what it was about those umpires I admired.
My favourite umpires were simply the ones who gave me votes. No, I’m kidding.
In all seriousness the most respected umpires in my mind were the ones with a personality. Umpires who would constantly communicate with players and even have banter with players.
I still remember a cold, wet day at Brian Weightman Oval playing against Mildura with current SFNL board member Jeff Hosking as the main central umpire on the day.
Jeff was one of my favourites because he could give as good as anyone whenever a player would get smart.
This particular day one of the opposition midfielders, who must not have had a great day, started to give a bit of lip to Jeff about a decision he’d made.
As smart as a whip Jeff turned around and started looking around at the players confused and then zeroed in on the player who was making the comments and said, “gee sorry mate, I honestly did not even realise you were playing today. Rather than worry about what I’m doing, just worry about getting a kick and keeping your spot in the team next week.”
Every player cracked up laughing and the player didn’t say a thing to the umpires the rest of the day.
There was a healthy respect from the players for umpires like this.
No umpire is perfect and no player is either. Both umpire and player will make mistakes every game, this is why having a personality from an umpire in my mind is so important.
Learning how to umpire, and appreciating the difficulty of umpiring, is something that all senior players should have the opportunity to do at least once every season.
In junior games every weekend you will see mums and dads and other volunteers blowing the whistle, and having done this myself a few times over the last couple of seasons, I can tell you it is definitely not as easy as it looks!
Getting yourself in the right positions to see everything happening in and around the contest is a very tough thing, and because of this it is very easy to miss something at some stage.
On the sidelines everybody will have a different view of the contest as the crowd has a 360-degree view. Someone on the other side of the oval will see a contest different to a supporter on the other side.
This is exactly the same for one umpire to another depending on which angle they have and how far away from the contest they are.
While the AFL has cracked down on umpire abuse (which I think is a great rule), I believe that having our local players step up and umpire at least one junior game each season will add to the steps we are taking to show restraint and respect to the umpires for the job they do each week.
I believe it would give the players a little taste of just how hard this job can be.
Plus the kids would absolutely love having their local idols on the field with them at the same time.
This week I am meeting with the president of the Sunraysia Football Umpires Association to speak about the positives and negatives that the umpiring fraternity are working through at the moment.
From the outside looking in, it certainly seems like participation numbers have increased, however I am wanting to learn more about their main challenges and to provide feedback to the football community on how we can all help them continue to expand.
Without the umpires, we simply don’t have a game, so I think it’s time we gave them the respect they deserve for the part they play and see how we can make it easier and more enjoyable for them to be the best they can be.
