St Mirren boss Stephen Robinson has revealed that he believes Scottish referees need to start working on a full-time basis if they are to stop making errors in games and when using VAR.
With Brendan Rodgers having spent much of his career in England, Premier League officials across the border are full-time, not part-time like they are in Scotland, meaning that they have other jobs during the week before refereeing at weekends.
It’s a no-brainer as to one of the reasons why the level of officiating in the country is so often criticised for simplistic errors.
With Celtic often on the end of refereeing mistakes, Robinson himself feels his St Mirren side have been similarly affected this season.
He said: (BBC Scotland),”Referees need help. Everybody needs help. We’re human. Everybody makes mistakes. That has always been the case in football.
“We want help for referees, they do the very, very best with what they can, and making them full-time, giving them more help with VAR, putting more money into that area is a no-brainer for me.
“In the current format, everybody wants it improved. Every club’s had decisions go for them, go against them.
“How do you do that? People doing that on a full-time basis, exposing themselves to decisions every minute of every day in referee training.”
Rodgers’ idea is one that most managers would agree with; however, sadly, the funding appears to be the reason why referees aren’t full-time at the time of writing. If it were to change, the SFA needs to find the funding.
However, given the length of time it took for VAR to be implemented in Scotland, it was yet another example of the Scottish governing body dragging their heels due to what they believe is a costly addition to the game.
The quality of games has been affected by VAR; however, VAR is not the issue itself.
Instead, it’s referees at times using it incorrectly with the decisions they come to. However, if this is to change, undoubtedly, officials need to become full-time, as Rodgers rightly previously suggested.
One club who absolutely do NOT WANT this would be “the rangers”!
They currently have control over Willie Collum and his squad! The last thing they want is interference from auditors, which would of course be the case when they became full time. Also it would make the under the table “bonus” payments currently on offer from the new club a lot more difficult to hide, even for a club with their experienced staff!