It's not the referees that lack consistency...

I've decided to get in early this year. Listening to an interview with Ricky Ponting where he wanted to bemoan umpiring decisions during the 2nd Ashes Test at Lord's but didn't, it occurred to me that football seems to have adopted the wrong mindset when it comes to the perception of referees.

There is a perception that referees 'need to be consistent', presumably with regards to decision making in order to create an expectation that can be attained on a regular basis. This view it would seem is supported not just by fans, commentators and managers, but by referees themselves. I happen to have a few issues with this theory though!

First up it's probably important to define what is currently accepted as a definition of a referee. As usual Wikipedia has it's own view:

A referee presides over a game of association football. The referee has "full authority to enforce the Laws of the Game in connection with the match to which he has been appointed" (Law 5), and the referee's decisions regarding facts connected with play are final, so far as the result of the game is concerned.

This I think covers the 'text book' definition and I would suspect is contested by few. There is probably another angle to explore, that being the common perception of what a referee is. Although there isn't really anything to cite to backup my theory, I suspect a referee is perceived by many as being a person to ensure fair play is achieved. Whilst not a ridiculous suggestion, I think most people connected to Football expect the success rate of this to be 100%. This is where I believe the problem lies!

The expectation of a referee is probably the same as a quiz host or a mortgage broker. In these instances you feed facts into a system and the host or broker delivers a verdict. The interpretation of these facts is automated so there is no subjective judgement to be passed by a human. In reality however, they should probably be closer to a Doctor or a Judge in terms of expectation: recognised to get most decisions correct but accepted that they can not achieve 100% as they are human!

To explore this point further, taking a scientific look at referees can explain the concept. When looking at even the basic of scientific experiments, the focus is on identifying variables from a group of constants in order to evaluate performance. The same can be found in problem solving. In order to diagnose what is wrong, we often find out what has changed first and then work from there. For example when a car breaks down because of a puncture, the puncture is the only variable that changed from when the car was working fine. With a referee, often the only constant when evaluating their job, decisions, performance etc. is the referee himself. Everything else is a variable.

Using a simple example to compare two 'similar' decisions, firstly look for the variables: if we look at two decisions over two games then these will include the date, time, location, probably both teams, maybe a different competition. These are just some of the more obvious variables. Then there are more obscure ones that a based on human behaviour: history between two teams, between teams and referee, previous incidents in press/media, recent criticisms of other referees etc. All of these will have a bearing on how the referee feels, thinks and ultimately acts. A late clip by the full back on the winger early in the game may go unpunished in the first game, receiving just a cautionary word from the referee, yet may be punished with a yellow card in the next game. Why? Unfortunately a variety of reasons! The referee may have been criticised for his decision in the previous game, he may be trying to assert his authority early on in the second game, the referee may perceive the full back deliberately clipped the winger in the second game but not the first.

There are two points that are important from the example above: referees are human and as such can not guarantee that subjective thinking will not come into their decision making and secondly, that only the referee has all the information available to him when making a decision. Commentators and managers can disagree but the only person who has all the information to make a decision is the referee.

So based on the theory and examples above, is it right to lay such expectations on referees? Would the same be made in other professions? There are a few similarities between referees and professions such as judges. Both make decisions that include an element of subjective thought. Both have a recognised appeal process to accommodate human error and mistakes being made, yet judges in general are not a vilified breed.

As an argument against referees, there will undoubtedly be incidents that referees should be expected to make correct decisions on. Black and White issues that take little subjective interpretation. In these instances it is probably fair to ask for a level of consistency and by their own admission, a lot of referees do acknowledge obvious mistakes. But if we are not to expect them to be able to interpret every situation correctly and make the appropriate decision, then what expectation should we have for referees?

Consistency should be found with our approach to how we view referees. More account should be given to the fact that a referee can not always produce consistent decision making due to the wide range of variables involved from one decision to the next. If this primary notion was accepted across the sport it would make a huge difference in the way referees are treated and accounted for. To cite Ricky Ponting, it is acceptable for players/managers and fans to disagree with the decisions taken by referees but they must be accepted as part of the game. Accepted in the same way that a player being injured during the match or sent off for an incident on which all agree was warranted are accepted by all parties as justified in altering the course of the game.

In addition to this there is also merit in the old adage that the decisions even themselves out across a season. Although I do not have any statistics to prove the theory, my hypothesis would be that contested decisions for and against a team even out during the course of the season.

Again to Ricky Ponting and rather than find excuses from questionable umpiring he chose to acknowledge the weaknesses of his side's play as reasons for their failure to win the match. Similarities could also be found in football. How many times has a manager blamed a referee for not awarding a penalty as justification for his side's inability to win the game, yet neglected to acknowledge the abundance of chances his strikers missed in open play? If a player is sent off then again the referee is blamed. Who questions why the player got themselves into that situation in the first place?

To summarise, consistency ought to be sort in the way everyone associated with football approaches the role of a referee in football. They should not be expected to find a level of consistency that exceeds the subjective capacity of their decision making. They should be expected to deliver the best decisions they can, and that erroneous decisions will even themselves out over the longer duration.

A referee is an easy scape goat for those who do not have the ability to question themselves when it comes to failure. A change in mind set to accept the limitations of a referee when evaluating the outcome of a game will go along way to improving the perception of referees and the quality of the decisions they give.

Last.fm: Interesting idea, just not sure about it

Another quiet session in the office and this time I've gone for a bit of Last.fm. I signed up a while ago and then a friend recommended Spotify, which was getting all the media attention at the time. I was put off by Spotify as it wasn't a web-based service. I found that a bit strange in this age where almost anything that is being developed seems to be adhering to Web 2.0 and beyond! Anyway, clearly when signing up to Last.fm I'd duly inputted my favourite artists and it has formed a radio station just for me.

This is what it's played thus far:

• Stereophonics
• Louis Armstrong
• Belle and Sebastian

Unfortunately I can't be more specific other than to say Louis sang A Wonderful World, as that was the only track I recognised. There doesn't seem to be any feature to look at what has just played, or what is coming up. I find that a little odd. Maybe it's just me, but I like to have some control over what I listen to. I'm naturally suspicious of my 'own radio station' and the first couple of tracks bore that suspicion out. They didn't really seem to fit, complement each other, or follow on from each other. The Belle and Sebastian track (Electric Renaissance) is a better fit with A Wonderful World I suppose. I probably shouldn't compare it with iTunes' Genius which creates a playlist of music that complements each other, but I am!

As this post is something approaching real time (radio playing in the background) we've now moved on to The Magic Numbers and This is a Song. That follows on from Belle and Sebastian quite well.

So, what to make of it all? Having listened to a handful of chosen songs I'm quite impressed: I haven't disliked anything I've heard and it has fitted in with the mood I wanted (background music to work and blog to!). I can see it's potential as a social networking site too. It would be easy to share and recommend music between friends and follow music friends are discovering as well as discuss and debate new music. The problem seems to be that I have to search for each friend! That puts me off a bit. There is a message to suggest that finding friends through Facebook, Gmail etc. is coming soon, but is said that months ago too!

Until there is a general consensus on how to create a single social networking profile for everyone to use across all the different platforms and sites, I think social networking can only flourish if its easy to find your existing friends (and I suppose new friends if that's what you want from social networking).

...

We're on Stevie Wonder and Higher Ground now. Normally Stevie would be an excellent choice. Unfortunately I several years ago I used Higher Ground as an alarm call and I've never really recovered from hearing it! Not really Last's fault though so I won't complain!

The more I listen the more I'm impressed. I will hold off judgement though until I've had a bit more of a play. For example, can I select an entire album to listen to, or stream a style of music such as Cool Jazz? These examples would add a lot to the site for me.

A guilty pleasure to sign off with: Dixie Chicks and So Hard. Each to their own I guess!

Nimbuzz leads the way in Aggregated Social Networking / Chat

It's so simple it's almost genius! The RSS reader of the chat-based world. 10 years ago if you wanted to read an article on a website, you more than likely typed the URL into Internet Explorer and off you went. Today, my Google Reader handles hundreds of feeds from all types of internet sites, organises them and displays them in an easy to read, share and digestible way. So the chat world is following in its footsteps.

For someone who has previously boasted to not really 'do' internet chats, I have an account to do the very same thing with Skype, Google Talk, MSN (or whatever they are called now) and even Facebook has an offering! I use Skype the most although to a limited amount of people, and then Google Talk and occasionally Facebook. Not a heavy user but enough to keep on top of!

A while ago I became aware of a service called Beejive. It basically aggregates your chat logins into a single application, loads your contacts (I can't quite bring myself to say 'buddies') into a screen and you chat to them over the relevant networks, but from the same, single interface. Almost revolutionary! Although it did cost. Not being an excessive user I decided against it.

Now though I have found Nimbuzz and in the short space of time I've been using it, also seen ebuddy which is the same thing. Nimbuzz has one edge over Beejive: it's free on the iPhone! This morning it updated to include push notifications (although not for Skype yet, which is a shame).

This new approach and functionality helps me so I'm sure it will other people! It also seems to be a continuation of transparency being the new driver in innovation. Twitter I believe is the first hugely successful service to let almost anyone and everyone have access to their data. Their own website isn't the number one interface to twitter! Yet this has almost made it successful. The brand and the infrastructure are the value in twitter, how people get there is not. The same can be said for a lot of the chat programs. Skype make their money through calls (which you can do using Nimbuzz too). Therefore it does make sense to make the process of calling as accessible as possible. I haven't used all of Nimbuzz's offerings yet as I've concentrated on the iPhone app but I struggle to see where they make their money from? Maybe they take a cut of skype and other programs calls? I did notice that Skype seem to have a financial interest in Nimbuzz.

Whatever the intracies of the financial model of this new approach, I do believe as a strategy it is probably the right one to follow and will lead the way in the future: organisations opening themselves up to increase their exposure and therefore revenue whilst at the same time making their service more accessible for their users is a pretty good idea to me!

Diana Krall on the BBC

I have, a little bit, taken leave of my senses! Having been conscious for a while that the Music section of my blog hasn't particularly received a lot of attention since the inception, I've decided a quick-fire method to address this is to post short, simple notes on what I'm currently listening to. Hopefully this will evolve into more in depth musing on music in general. Time will tell!

Anyway, first up is Diana Krall. Having the fortune of an empty office for once, I've been listening to her recent concert on BBC Radio 2 on the BBC iPlayer. I've become more and more impressed with Krall the more I listen to her. Most notably because my iPhone seems to have developed a 'thing' for her when in shuffle mode! I knew Michael Parkinson was a fan but didn't really get why. Slowly but surely that's changing. I like her style of song, her melodies and voice but mainly how the piano gently accompanies the voice, changing gear for the solos in a subtle yet distinct manner. Her solos aren't manic, but are more energetic than they can often sound!

I shall by taking a closer look at the new album come pay day!

Gmail out of Beta!

I know they have their arguments as to why it has been in Beta for the past five years; continual innovation etc. but Google are one of my all time favourite companies and I'm glad to see GMail, Calendar and Docs are all out of beta nonetheless!

As announced on their Twitter profile, http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2009/07/google-apps-is-out-of-beta-yes-really.html

Tioti TV+ vs SKY+ for iPhone...

v's

I'm at a cross roads!

I've posted a couple of times now about my experiences remotely recording my Sky+ box (using Tioti TV+ and Sky+ iPhone Apps). Although I could not reach any formal conclusion, since trying both applications I've tended to stick with Sky's offering. Tioti TV+ lost marks because I could never get my head around the social networking aspect of the site. I duly signed up as I said I would and had a rummage around but is just didn't do anything for me! Sky won over basically because it came down to brand loyalty and the fact it was their application for their own product, a concept I like.

However since OS 3.0 Tioti has moved first! They've released a new version of their app which includes the holy grail of push notifications. You can now select a programme to record, mark it for notification and add it to favourites. The latter will also push notifications 5 minutes before the programme start. I really like the feature and have found myself moving back to Tioti TV+. It also, in hindsight, seems faster than Sky's application.

The new release has really put Sky's offering into perspective for me; using their own API's they have cobbled together a simple offering that seems to have required very little thought, less still imagination or innovation. Maybe they'll catch up but until they do I can't see their app will get much use!

All of which brings me to my cross-road: I want to use Sky's application but I want the functionality of Tioti's! My logic is not sound, I know. I like the concept of using additional innovative offerings by people like Sky. To be it shows that they are committed to ensuring they offer the best possible service to their customers. I think I mainly want them to succeed, rather than an objective aligning to what they have to offer.

It will be interesting to see how it pans out...

PS. Just had an email from Sky saying I can watch the ashes on my PC (previous charge had applied). All is forgiven! Tioti TV+ who?

WT20's place at the top table?

I always find it useful when discussing Twenty20 to find out exactly what camp someone sits in before they start! It's not to pre-judge their opinions based upon my view of these camps, more to understand why they make the points they do. To clarify, I think there are three main camps: Traditionalist, Modernist, InBetweenist! OK, so I need a new name for the third but that'll do for now.

To work within my own guidelines, I confess I'm the third, as yet poorly defined, category. Traditionalists and Modernist are fairly easy to understand; one prefers Test Matches and views anything other as 'not quite cricket'. The other [modernist] aligns their wants of cricket to more contemporary sports such as football and rugby, where pace, entertainment and gladiatorial power are more sort after commodities than grace, tactical acumen and polite sportsmanship. Neither I believe to be right or wrong, which I guess explains why I find myself in the middle of the two!

I've always liked Test Match cricket. When people ask why I like Cricket in general, I've always referred to sitting outside on a sunny summer's day, watching sport and drinking beer! I like the pace of the game and the gentleness of its appearance. Like most cricket forms I also enjoy the fact that the most drama or mediocre of matches all unfold the same way: bowler runs up and delivers. From there anything can and often does happen. Listening to Cricket commentary it so often appears that the bowler is in charge. They set the field, dictate the line and length of the ball and can make the ball leave the hand with subtle, yet effective variations. However this does not keep a good batsman down for long! The battle between batsman and bowler is the most fascinating part of cricket and at its most prevalent during test match cricket.

I will also admit that I viewed Twenty20 cricket with an element of disdain. Not because I'm incapable of being a modernist, or accepting of change in the game, because I don't think I'm guilty on either count. My main objection was that the introduction of 'ugly' cricket shots as the norm in this particular format of the game. I felt it was unnecessary to promote elements of batting that required little skill. I've since climbed down on that particular remark as I do appreciate the hand/eye co-ordination and sheer power required to slog the ball to the boundary! Improvisation (for example, Dilshan's Scoop) I'm all for, but the slogging element does still erk me. My other negative thoughts towards Twenty20 mainly come from sitting with 10,000 Lancashire supporters in the rain watching Yorkshire get thumped a couple of years back!

With the World Twenty20 just about to get underway, I was however looking forward to the tournament. When this summer's schedule was announced it was just something that filled a calendar month before the Ashes and I had no immediate plans to watch it, but as it grew closer I did find myself more intrigued. I held little hope for an English success from the Men's team, but wanted to study the format in closer detail. I was impressed with the tournament for a few reasons:

The first thing that stuck me was that improvisation was no longer the right of the batsmen. I'd watched Saj Mahmood of Lancashire bowling slow-ball bouncers in the domestic competition and was impressed at the success it had in controlling an over. On the international stage it was also used to good effect. When Harbhajan Singh refused to bowler once Kevin Peterson adopted the Switch-Hit stance, that was another scalp in the rights of bowlers during this tournament! It was spin bowling however, that seemed to see the greatest resurgence during the tournament.

The second most notable outcome of the World T20 however was the role of the established test player. Kallis for South Africa, Dilshan for Sri Lanka in particular but Gayle, Vetorri, Harbhajan, Chanderpaul all showed that a truly class cricketer can prosper in all forms of the game.

My final observation was mainly a personal one. Although the 'ugly' shots were still on show, much of the big hitting was a) from established players and b) clean hitting (for want of a better phrase!). I also found myself enjoying the flying sixes in matches, particularly when the power plays were being exploited by the batsmen. I came to the conclusion that maybe you can forgive the odd slog!

However my overall view on WT20 is slightly more calculated. I noted a few times on Test Match Special and Sky commentaries that our experts often said that in T20 teams who lose early wickets simply don't have the time to rebuild an innings. I don't necessarily agree with that and Sri Lanka can cite a good case in point when looking at the final game. They didn't post the biggest total after losing early wickets but they adopted a strategy and it almost worked for them.

This first observation also seems to lead to the second, in which it was often felt that T20 cricket would replace 50 over cricket in the future because it eliminated the lull in the middle overs of 50 over cricket. I would again argue otherwise! A lot of matches I watched involved the same format. Big start to the innings, then take the singles at 6 per over for the next nine or 10 overs, hoping for a boundary ball every over or so to top up the total before letting lose at the end. It's not too far fetched from the 50 over game plan. I'm not an expert but I'd guess this is probably due to the age-old one-day philosophy of keeping wickets in hand for the end of the innings. I'm not sure T20 has overcome that mindset quite yet.

So to WT20's place at the top table? I'm not convinced it should replace 50 over cricket, although that's not to say I don't see that happening. T20's main advantages lie logistically. As seen in this tournament, more than one match can take place per day and back-to-back matches are realistic. I'd much prefer this approach introduced into the international format, maybe at the expense of lots on 50 over cricket and the Champions Trophy. After a test series why can't three of more countries contest a couple of 50 over games and then a quick T20 tournament over a long weekend or holiday period? You shouldn't have to search the globe with teams to make up the numbers either. In Europe we have Ireland, Scotland and Holland who would benefit from the exposure of playing more established teams. There are plenty of other smaller national around the world who could do the same.

Whatever is decided, the mantra should be Quality over Quantity. It will take resourcefulness and innovation to make that commercially feasible but it's not impossible. In short, more tournament T20 I think is the future, where it can share it's place alongside 50 over cricket and test matches.