The president of the Estonian Football Federation, Aivar Pohlak, underlined, presenting the referee conference held for the first time, that the prerequisites for becoming a good referee are not those who know how to block criticism, but those who also know how to draw conclusions from negativity. . According to him, personality development and well-thought-out education are important.
Pohlak gave an example of the development talks he held with players, which shows that you have to be able to make sense of even big goals. “In the players’ questionnaire there was a question: what are your ambitions in football? 95% answered that they see themselves in one of the five major leagues. We then changed the question so that it touched more on personality: which person qualities support your path to becoming a footballer and which ones don’t?” he gave an example.
“If I were to make a similar questionnaire for referees, it seems to me that in the case of a referee the personality content is even more important for success than in the case of a player. In my opinion, the job of a referee is like a mirror of personality. The main question could be in a similar questionnaire or in a dialogue with myself: what have I learned about myself through the activity of a referee? What do I like and what don’t I like about this?” Pohlak argued.
He pointed out that the synonym for judge has been judge over the centuries. “It has a very clear meaning: the referee must take part in managing the game according to the agreed rules in a fair manner. The meaning of the mirror in this context is this: if you can watch yourself from the sidelines, you will learn “A lot about yourself from what you do on the field. You always have to, in difficult situations, make decisions in parallel, behave, communicate, be a pedagogue and so on.”
Apparent criticism may be manipulation
Pohlak drew attention to another important aspect. “Don’t grow a thick skin! Instead, learn to deal with negativity, let it affect you. Because society works exactly the same way and your life will be much easier as a result. Of course, you also need to understand the meaning of public space. There is information, but also what appears to be information, but through which people are actually influenced. Through apparent criticism, which is made in public space, attempts are often simply made to manipulate the judge. This information should not be rejected, but they should be addressed,” he said.
When will Estonia be able to have professional judges? “We do not have the usual logic of professional referees due to the small size of the country, the commercial nature and so on. Of course the smallness is not a problem in itself, because even in small Cyprus, for example, more than ten million are We paid the television rights of the local league – explains Pohlak – but at the same time we also pay for our broadcasts. So we have to find new ideas. One of these tools is RefPal for example: if more people could find work as analysts there, they would essentially become professional referees” , Pohlak offered.
RELATED STORIES
2024-01-24 02:37:16
pohlak-to-referees-dont-get-thick-skin-you-learn-to-know-yourself-through-negativity-soccernet-ee
#Pohlak #referees #dont #thick #skin #learn #negativity #Soccernet.ee