One thing that annoys me is sports fans who are uneducated in the laws of the sport they love and follow. Even if you used to play the sport it does not mean you know or fully understand all the laws. I have seen current players who play the sport as a profession being told by referees why the decisions were made and having to explain certain rules.
This morning we had friends and family over for a brunch and the topic of yesterdays rugby match between the All Blacks and South Africa was raised. When your team loses many look for excuses instead of asking why a certain decision was given. I cut them all short saying maybe they should watch the game again and spot the differences between the various incidents as they were now making themselves look stupid and ignorant. The topic was never mentioned again and later on I explained to them why they were all wrong and to either learn the rules or keep quiet.
What seems to have triggered thousands of SA rugby fans and ex professional players who are now commentators is the yellow carding of one of the SA players. This to me was officiated correctly and saw no wrong in why this decision was made. Something similar happened later in the game and there was no yellow card for the New Zealand player. This again was the right call as the only difference between both incidents was the New Zealand player never interfered with the penalty advantage. The SA player sent off stopped any advantage of occurring by committing another illegal move and why the yellow card was shown.
When one looks at social media and sees the negative comments towards a referee who did his job. There were some mistakes made but on the whole this was not a bad game by the officials involved. The social media negativity highlights ignorance and a lack of understanding of the laws.
The weird thing is you as a sports fan think very differently when you become a referee in a sport. I would have been a professional rugby referee if a back injury had not robbed me of a career in sport. I may love my SA rugby, but I have no blinkers on and only see one side and I have to be impartial whoever is playing. You call it as it is and there are no grey areas and I just wish commentators on television would not lead the masses on. Their duty is to report on what is happening for both sets of fans and not only for one team.
In the past there have been some shocking referee performances and this was one of the reasons why I became a referee. Poor officiating can ruin the game and the people I feel sorry for the most is the players as they train so hard and are the ones who are robbed. Bad calls with the Virtual Assistant Replay (VAR) now in most games should be a thing of the past yet we still see them sneaking through and expect one or two in every game.
These days I try and watch certain sports on my own as there is nothing worse than having people watching with you who are biased and do not know the rules. At the end of the day this is just a game and not a life or death scenario so why let something you have no control over get you upset.