My Week - This Week!!

Cup Semi Final - Linesman

I ran the line for a cup semi-final during the week. It was freezing. But you bare it, I guess that's what you do when you have so much love for the game. The game was Cotgrave Utd vs Real Utd, virtually bottom against virtually the top of the league, if we put it that way. What would be predicted to happen in this game basically did, Real dominated the game, especially in the first half, they were all over them, never gave them any chance to get involved or create any opportunities at all, apart from the odd count attack, which didnt really lead to much either. However, from a referee perspective, although no game is really ever an 'easy' game, this wasn't an action packed game with just the odd careless fouls going in, mainly from the frustrated Cotgrave players. So this was, in my opinion quite an enjoyable game to be watched.

Today I ran the line for a local league match, Wollaton vs Attenborough, within the Nottingham senior league, this is a local derby between the two clubs, therefore although they have 13 league positions between them both, this is always an exciting game and normally very close. however this one was an exception. Wollaton dominated the whole game, apart from a few minutes within the second half where they got the odd possession and had the confidence to get past players. the biggest and some would say most entertaining bit of the game was in the second half where a young lad came on from the bench, Wollaton had a free kick, so he came on and marked a player but as soon as the free kick happened he ran towards the opponent and went in with excessive force, and a bit of abusive language after the tackle, saw him get sent off before he even got chance to touch the ball, I'd say he was on then off the pitch within a good 10 seconds. who knows, maybe he was late for a date.

Tomorrow is a big day. Radcliffe play in the Semi Final of the women's cup final against Ruddington We had a great game last week against Leicester, but we lost 3-2. This week we need to do exactly what we did against Leicester as we dominated the whole game, but just got robbed in the last 10 minutes. This will be a close match, as this is also seen to be a local derby so both teams will really want to win, however, I have no doubt that we will put all our effort in and bag a few early, and tidy the game up as that's what we lacked against Leicester, so once we have this aspect mastered, I believe there is no stopping us.

And, at the end of the day tomorrow - I will know if I'm either playing in the Final, or Refereeing it?

And to top it all, I got my Referee promotion letter. Happy days.