St Mirren boss echoes Brendan Rodgers call for full time referees

The Celtic Star

·6 Februari 2025

St Mirren boss echoes Brendan Rodgers call for full time referees

St Mirren manager Stephen Robinson is the latest manager to call on the SFA to make referees in the Scottish top flight full time…

Stephen Robinson, Head Coach of St. Mirren, reacts prior to the Scottish Premiership match between Celtic and St. Mirren at Celtic Park on January 05, 2025. (Photo by Ian MacNicol/Getty Images)

Robinson is echoing a call from Brendan Rodgers

Currently, officials work on a part-time basis, picking up games alongside other employment. However, the Irishman believes that the standard of refereeing would improve if officials were to go full time.

Video OneFootball

Robinson is echoing a call from Brendan Rodgers to improve the standard of refereeing in Scotland by creating full time positions for referees, as is the case in England.

Speaking on Thursday ahead of the Scottish Cup weekend, Robinson was asked about the missed incident in his side’s 1-0 defeat to St Johnstone at the weekend and how he would move to improve the decision making amongst officials.

Referee Colin Steven during the Scottish Premiership match between Hearts and Dundee at Tynecastle on 7 December 2024. Photo: Malcolm Mackenzie PSI

“Everybody wants to vilify someone in this world now, everyone wants to blame somebody.” the St Mirren boss said. “You lose games due to players and managers’ mistakes as well as referees but how can you help them?

How can we make it better?

“VAR was put in place to help when they made mistakes, to rectify them. It’s currently not doing that to the level we all hoped. How can we make it better? Doing it full time would be my suggestion.

“If you do something on a daily basis, every day, you have to be better than doing it part-time. You have to be. The law of averages suggest you will get it right more often. Like a full-time footballer will make better decisions than a part-time one because he does it every day.

Referee David Dickinson at Tannadice, Dundee Utd v Celtic, Sunday 22 December 2024. Photo Vagelis Georgariou

“Maybe that’s one step.”

The Celtic manager has previously made the same suggestion towards improving the Scottish game. This claim in his first term in Scottish football did not result in any change but coming back in the summer of 2023, Scottish football introduced VAR and they can continue progressing with the implementation of full time referees.

Callum McGregor is presented with a framed shirt to commemorate his 500 appearances by Brendan Rodgers, prior to the Scottish Premiership match between Celtic and Dundee at Celtic Park on February 05, 2025. (Photo by Ian MacNicol/Getty Images)

Making referees full time will not eliminate mistakes

Making referees full time will not eliminate mistakes. A glance to English football shows that full time referees are not always correct in their decision making. There have been a number of high profile incidents this season alone involving referees and VAR failing to spot an incident or simply mistaking an incident.

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