By Lee Hill

A lot has been made recently of the constant harassment, disrespect and disregard for the men in black and the laws they are put in place to enforce. This has been a problem for a number of years in my opinion and in reality the issue has always been brushed under the carpet.

Why I hear you ask....

The usual suspects are all, strangely enough, playing for the supposed cream of the Premier League. The Premier League is the governing body that regulates the rules etc with regards to the top flight. They are fully aware that those top clubs are the main reason for the Premier League becoming the gravy train it has become so why upset that by punishing the clubs for their ill discipline? The clubs have no fear or respect for the football governing bodies whether it be the Football Association or Premier League. It’s quite ironic hearing managers such as Ferguson urging players to show respect towards officials, when only weeks earlier he is blasting the match official for his performance in the FA Cup tie versus Portsmouth. As usual that gets forgotten about and Ferguson is left to get on with his job while the latest person to come under attack surfaces. The ever likeable Ashley Cole. A real charmer of a man who recently had to apologise for his actions on the pitch which in turn led to every referees best friend John Terry publicly speaking out about giving referees respect, again the irony appeared lost on his tiny brain.

So, that’s Man United and Chelsea covered, onwards we march. Javier Mascherano was dismissed in quite bizarre fashion for constantly harassing the match day official while against Man United. Quite what he was hoping to achieve is anyone’s guess but alas the red card was shown and still Mascherano pleads his innocence while Benitez claims it was down to 'passion'. Quite frankly I was under the impression that stupidity and passion were quite different things, maybe I am wrong. Passion would entail geeing your team-mates up and in turn putting in an inspiring performance while doing everything in your power to ensure success for your desired cause whatever the cost. Does that sound like Mascherano? Not on your nelly. Last but by no means least we have Mr. Wenger. The classless Frenchman is well known for his 'indiscretions'. He has the remarkable ability to spot referee errors with eagle like precision, however one of his players steps out of line and the view is somewhat misty. Wenger is never slow to pounce on a referee for anything he does not agree with and constantly embarrasses himself with his bleating and whingeing. Just recently of course he decided Taylor should have been banned for life for breaking the leg of Eduardo. Perhaps we should rip up the rule book of over 100 years to appease Wenger and his quest for a pure and clean game? He may have a point if his own side was not so littered with ill-discipline, violence, petulance, disrespect, spitting and the like.

Do we ever see such blatant disregard, disrespect or general bitchiness from Managers below the esteemed 'Big 4'? Very rarely is the answer you are looking for. So in short, these are the clubs that the 'Respect' initiative should be aimed at. The rule being bandied around about the captain being the only person able to speak to the referee is fine in principle, then you take a peek at the captains of the aforementioned clubs, Gary Neville, Steven Gerrard, William Gallas and John Terry. Hardly beacons of respect with regards to the 'powers that be' are they. This rule would surely eradicate any point in having a goalkeeper as the captain as that would clearly be unworkable. In practice this rule is going backwards. If we can’t teach grown men that you need to respect the authority and the law makers then it echoes through to the rest of society.

This is not a one way street though. These officials need to earn that respect. The only way they can do that is to shape up or ship out. Incorrect and missed decisions have been more frequent than ever before. How can we encourage respect to a person who is so clearly incompetent? Hopefully the FA, the Premier League and the clubs themselves can find some common ground and the rest of us can read the back page of the newspaper without enduring a weekly rant from one of the 'big 4' managers.

Sadly that is a dream bigger than Aretha Franklin's waist line

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