Respect the Game

This past week I had an opportunity to be a spectator at a high school varsity soccer scrimmage. The key point that I want to make is that this was a scrimmage, and for all intensive purposes was meant to prepare both the players and referees for the upcoming fall season. With that being said the coach from one of the schools pulled his team off the field in 48th minute because one of the referees issued a red card for violent conduct.

To the coach this was the icing on the cake as two minutes prior one of his players received a red card for a 2nd caution for "delaying the game". Both of the cards mentioned above were all correctly assessed and the right decision by the referee. However, the coach felt that since this was a summer league and scrimmages that the referee didn't need to eject the players.

The question I have is... When is it ever ok for a coach to pull his team off the field due to the referee doing his job? To me this is the most disrespectful thing that a coach can ever do. It is worse that yelling at a referee and calling him names. Those are just words, pulling your team from the field of play is beyond disrespectful not only to the referee, but the game of soccer. This is the problem with the game of soccer in 2014. So what is the solution to this? We have to continue to educate players, coaches and parents on the game of soccer. We must NOT TOLERATE these types of actions now or in the future, and when these instances happen we MUST hold the parties involved ACCOUNTABLE for their actions.