Aytekin and the trash cans: More respect for the referees, please!

In football, the referee is generally regarded as the poorest pig on the pitch. The professional referees in the Bundesliga still receive a decent compensation for their work. However, they also have to put up with a lot: fan insults to cups being thrown, packs of freaking professionals around them and then angry coaches who like to express their frustration with the referee in more or less clear words or gestures .

On Wednesday evening in the cup game between Mainz and Bayern Munich the fuses of the coach of the 05ers blew. Bo Svensson asked the referees if they were “blind” and was given a red card. Deniz Aytekin saw a limit crossed and later justified the dismissal as follows: “We can take a lot, that’s all right. But … we are not the nation’s dustbin.”

He is right! It is a bad habit that is particularly widespread in football. It’s always the referee’s fault. Or, more recently, the video referee. Incidentally, in the case of Mainz, it was already 0:3 from their point of view, the game had long since been lost – and ultimately also decency. Although Svensson later apologized to Aytekin, he still suspected that Bayern were fundamentally favored by the referees: “It’s not quite balanced.”

So much for insight. When will athletes, coaches and officials finally understand that referees make mistakes too? With all the tension in the game, is it really completely impossible to heed at least the basic forms of mutual respect? And is Bo Svensson actually aware of what a role model he makes with statements like Wednesday’s? Criticism is fine, but there really is no need for wild insults, especially with regard to amateur football.

By the way, another sport proves that there is another way. In rugby, the referee is second only to God, there only the team captains are allowed to speak to him at all. In this respect at least, football still has a lot to learn.