AWFA referee Daniel Moore on the relationship between players, coaches, spectators and officials

The 41-year-old has revealed officials have been subjected to increased abuse since the return of soccer after the cancelled 2020 season.

But the former player also admits referees need to show more respect to players and coaches by improving their communication during games.

"I started refereeing because I wanted to give back to society for all the crap I'd given," Moore said.

"I was the worst - ask any of them!

"When I first rocked up for a senior game, the first words from people were 'how could you be a referee?'

"But they understood I don't mind them playing a bit harder so long as it's a good, fair game.

"Having played the game is invaluable.

"You can't put a price on it because you can tell tackles that are bad and ones that aren't.

"You can deal with it a bit better and I can understand where players are coming from, when they're getting frustrated and yelling."

Moore certainly did plenty of that in his playing days.

He once received a 12-week ban for an ugly rant at referee Colin Campbell, who has since become his mentor.

"Refereeing is 90 percent man-management and 10 percent knowing the laws," Moore said.

"If I can man-manage a player or a team well, I might make one of my few mistakes in the game and get them to be OK with it, rather than lose their crap.

"We do need a lot more respect for referees around this area because it has got worse this year.

"I don't know if anxiety from COVID has put people back a year and they've regressed, if they've got pent-up frustration and are releasing it, I don't know.

"But young kids coming through are not going to want to be a part of that if it continues."

There is work to be done on both sides, though.

"Respect is earned," Moore said.

"Everyone talks about respecting referees and it definitely needs to happen more often, but we need to give some back too.

"It's a two-way street.

"I'm not always right and I don't mind owning up to mistakes. I'd rather show that I'm human.

"If I make a mistake, sometimes I'm thinking about it until Wednesday, what I've done on the weekend, whether I've done it right or what I could have done better.

"There are some out there that just don't like me.

"I've done one thing in the past and they don't like me. I think all refs get that.

"There are others where it doesn't matter how much you try to man-manage and maybe talk to them before giving them a card, they're still not going to like you.

"It just does not matter because you're in black and you've got a whistle in your hand.

"It's the old 'black maggot' saying.

"But we're all human, we go home and we've got families.

"It's sad because I've been around a couple of refs who copped a bit of crap and it was about family. That's just not on.

"Whether we get it right or wrong out there, we don't criticise the four shots you put into the tree to kill koalas instead of hitting the target but, as referees, we get scrutinised a lot more because there's only one of us making mistakes, not 11."

Moore was a central figure in one of this season's most controversial incidents.

A penalty which came back off the post was converted by the taker and Moore, believing the goalkeeper had got fingertips to the initial effort, awarded the goal.

However, when footage later appeared on social media showing the keeper hadn't touched the ball, Moore publicly apologised for making the wrong call.

"Even now, having done five years of senior refereeing, I still go home after every game having learnt something," he said.

"When I played, I didn't like the refs who said 'talk to the hand' and walked away.

"Sometimes I can't talk, and sometimes talking gets me into trouble because I say too much and they pull on that string.

"But I'd rather try to explain it, even if they don't like it, because then we can move on rather than them hold onto it for 20 minutes.

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"We have a few good young refs coming through at the moment but if we don't look after them, they'll go.

"There's a couple I know that have done a year or two and they're like 'I don't want to put up with that any more.'

"We have a shortage of refs at the upper levels this year.

"There's been a few times where reserve games have been reffed by club refs, which hasn't happened in a long time.

"It doesn't matter which ref you get, we're all going to make mistakes so focus on what you can focus on and move on quicker because then you'll be playing football, not mind games."

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