One of my pet peeves when refereeing the "beautiful game" is poor sportsmanship. On Friday night, I was assistant referee for two games. Unfortunately, the referee pulled a muscle in his calf and couldn't complete the 2nd game, so I took over the game.The young men on both teams were such whiners and complainers, that they spent more time bitching and complaining about what I was doing than they did concentrating on their own play.
After the game (which ended as a 0-0 tie), the captain of one of the teams came up to me to ask me a question about the game. He made it clear that he had no intention of shaking my hand in a gentlemanly way. In fact, that team did not shake the hands of any of the officials in the game (with a couple of exceptions who did). I don't understand why people need to be such poor sports! It's not my fault they didn't win the game, it's my job to make sure that the rules are followed and that everyone "plays nice". News flash - No one is perfect, so I probably did make one or two mistakes in the game. But, I don't think there was anything that changed the course of the game. Grow up already!
