Competitive sport cannot exist without referees, umpires, judges; call them what you will, depending on the sport in question. These are the people who control the game from start to finish, and whose decisions have a direct bearing on the outcome.

Officials have to be balanced, objective and unbiased. They must decide on the action, and not look at who is involved or who is playing. They must detach themselves from the names of the participants, and rule according to what they see.

But referees are human too. They can make mistakes in the same way that players do; often these mistakes push the game in one direction or another. They are influenced by the atmosphere surrounding the event, and can also feel the pressure of the media. They are as tense as the players are. And they too can have a bad day sometimes.

The important thing is that the errors they commit are genuine, and not a result of ulterior and outside factors and motives known only to the officials – and maybe a few others who prejudiced them before the game, perhaps with a few words or, even worse, a bribe.

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The question I have always asked myself about referees is this: how is it possible that they, at least inwardly, do not support one of the teams they officiate every now and then?

My reasoning is this – normally, one is attracted to a particular sport at a young age, when there cannot be any intention of becoming a referee. And, normally, when one is following sport, he or she supports a particular team (or player, if the sport is individual). It is only later in life, after years supporting that team, that one makes a decision to become a referee.

There is also a possibility that referees, when they were much younger, were members of nurseries of particular clubs. There have been many instances when referees readily admitted that they took up refereeing when they realised that they could never make it as a player.

Now, tell me, is it possible for that person to forget his or her bias towards or attachment with the team they supported or of which they formed part when officiating a match?

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Referees can also become biased temporarily in the course of a game. If they are deeply offended by supporters, they tend to “favour” the other side when it comes to 50-50 decisions, or take drastic ones against the supporters offending them.

A player who protests vehemently against a decision may find himself in the referee’s bad books too, and may start being penalised without mercy from then onwards.

In this respect, it is always better for players to protest as little as possible, and for fans to stick to supporting their team, rather than offend the referee.

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Abroad, there is the practice of not allowing referees from a particular town to officiate at matches of teams that belong to that town. This is done to avoid having referees control games in which their town is represented. But it does not necessarily follow that the referees in question support the team of their town. So it can never be excluded that a referee controls a match in which his “favourite” team is taking part.

Here in Malta, most of us support foreign teams. But this phenomenon is not only present in our little island. It is present everywhere. I know people who have lived in Rome all their lives, but they support Juventus, Milan or Inter. And so, technically speaking, if they had become referees, they would have been excluded from officiating matches involving Roma or Lazio, and any other club in the region, but they could be allowed to control matches involving the team they support.

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There have been occasions when on their retirement referees have taken up positions with clubs. Again, although they may claim that it was a professional decision taken after the conclusion of their career as an official, it is possible that the club in question was the one they supported before and during their time as referees.

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There’s another thing. Apart from teams one supports as a child, there are teams that one dislikes too. Normally, it is a team that either wins too much, or is the biggest rival of the team one supports. So, while residential status or membership in a club may preclude referees from officiating at matches of teams they support, there may be occasions when they control matches of teams they dislike. And I do have doubts whether it is possible that their bias against this team is totally eliminated.

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While all referees have the same responsibility, there are some officials who control a sport that is easier to manage than others.

Tennis is one such example. Helped by a number of line-judges, and now with the aid of technology, umpires can be perfect, or nearly perfect, in their control. There is no room for interpretation – the ball is either in or out, and electronics are now making sure that the right decision is taken.

It is a different story in football. Referees here make a hundred decisions in a given game, but there are occasions when two or three of them could be highly controversial. The outcome depends very much on these decisions – offsides and penalties (given or not) may alter the course of a game. And here no technology is allowed to assist the refs.

Where referees have the most power is in heavy-contact sport like basketball and, even more, in water polo, where most action takes place under the water. Very often, in these sport disciplines, referees see things a million other eyes do not see – and therefore their bias in favour or against could be more evident for the neutral supporter.

In these disciplines, the interpretation given by referees is at its widest possible: what was a foul at one end could be play-on at the other end, even though similar actions occur. In games between teams of equal or almost equal strength it is highly possible for referees to steer the match in a given direction.

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