Dealing With Bad Refs (The Right Way)
The best way to deal with bad refereeing in soccer is not to deal with it.
As a player, your focus should be playing. Defending, attacking, making tackles, and communicating with your teammates should be your focus.
Naturally, you’ll get refs that won’t make the right calls. They’ll miss calls. They’ll ignore offsides.
Like you, they’ll make mistakes.
If a ref makes a call you don’t agree with, just let it go. They won’t change a call because you barked at them. Don’t let this type of energy steal you from playing your best.
For any call a referee makes – whether good or bad – here’s what to do…
- Accept It
- Continue Playing Soccer
Pretty simple to do right? Yes!
But, guess what? It’s also easy not to do. It takes practice to accept every call.
At the end of the day, you’ll be a much better player because of it.
Oh, and if you are getting recruited, the coach or scout will love that you don’t complain.
Parents – please take this advice as well.
Written By: Beau Bridges
Founder of SoccerNovo
I’m Beau 👋 a proud dad of an MLS NEXT player, former soccer coach, soccer enthusiast, and board member of our local youth sports program. I created soccernovo.com to share my knowledge of the game and help parents learn more about youth soccer in the U.S. I also authored an eBook ‘Soccer Coach Made Simple‘. Learn more about Beau.
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