After a year of dealing with a stream of referee abuse issues involving players, coaches and side-line spectators, Northland Football are looking to address this with a series of Good Sports Workshops similar to what Hockey Northland have been doing.

“Good Sports philosophy and messages are included in our coaching framework but these messages are not always being heard in regard to refereeing. Referee criticism from coaches quickly flows onto the players and the result is an unpleasant experience for everyone.” says Northern Football Federation Regional Manager Dave Alabaster.

“Some of our coaches could do with listening to themselves and looking at the way they behave. We are looking at a revised player sanction system as well as an educative piece” says Alabaster.

Good Sports workshops will be run at a number of Football clubs this year and an end goal is to have Good Sport ambassadors in clubs who will influence some of the behaviours that would be good to promote and eliminate those that are more undesirable. Other aligned initiatives will include messaging on clubroom walls and a different approach to acknowledging players each week.

“While referee abuse is quite significant, we also hear about the difficulties in getting referees and any initiative that can address the referee experience must impact the game. In the younger grades it becomes one of the responsibilities of the coach and that creates some challenges also” says Sport Northland Coaching Lead, Grant Harrison who goes onto explain that it would be great in some levels to have referee-less games.  “Just like the pick-up games we see in the school playgrounds and parks. Playing guidelines are agreed and negotiated by the players who then seem to enjoy themselves more. Sometimes when adults get involved, it changes the experience of the young people and that is where Good Sports messages are important by creating a development environment where the young people are not so focussed on performing but more on enjoying and meeting their success goals.”

NZ Football’s initiative to have “Game Managers” at the beginner level rather than coaches emphasises the learning environment which is best created in a game-like way (which is in alignment with Good Sports). This also de-mystifies coaching which in turn could lend itself to more coaches taking up the option of coaching when the time is right. 

Currently some clubs are scheduled for Good Sports Workshops with the first few having occurred in Waipapa, Kaitaia, Dargaville, Kamo and Onerahi. In the next weeks, a number more will be delivered in other clubs throughout Northland.

For further information about the Northern Football Federation Good Sports initiative with Football Clubs contact Dave Alabaster dave.alabaster@nff.org.nz