Referees call for more to be done to prevent increasing abuse and violence on pitches and sidelines

Sickening brawls, physical attacks and verbal abuse have become all-too-regular occurrences on our sporting fields, despite a major NSW government initiative aimed at stamping it out.

Almost three violent incidents a week are taking place in NSW community sport, ­despite a major state government ­initiative aimed at ­combating the crisis.

Figures from the Bureau of Crime Statistics and Research (BOSCAR) show violence on the state’s playing fields and sports centres has returned to pre-covid levels and is getting worse.

It comes as NSW Rugby League officials investigate a brawl between spectators and officials at an under-12s footy match on The Central Coast last Sunday, while five people were charged over an ugly brawl that erupted on the sidelines of an U7s soccer game at Prospect View Park in Fairfield in Sydney’s west in April.

Referees on the front line of tackling the violence have told The Saturday Telegraph more needs to be done, despite the state government and Sport NSW claiming the $500,000 Fair Play Network and Shoosh for Kids programs had succeeded in calming angry confrontations.

A recent brawl on The Central Coast between Kincumber and Ourimbah rugby league fans is just one of several that occur every week on sporting fields across NSW.

Former Lithgow District Football Referees president Geoff Ogg resigned after 17 years at the start of this season following an incident during an U8 match.

“The referee was 13 or 14 years old and the team manager came and had a real go at him and that just confirmed to me that I had had enough,” Mr Ogg said. “It is echoed right through the game. Referees cop it and the Shoosh campaign is really not working.”

BOSCAR statistics show that last year there were 150 assaults reported to police at sports grounds and centres across NSW. Two thirds of those were at outdoor sports fields.

That number was up on the pre-covid total of 139 in 2019 and creeping towards the 10-year high of 166 assaults in 2018.

A NSW Police spokesman said there was “zero tolerance” for aggressive or violent behaviour in the community.

“Anyone who organises or participates in violent or anti-social behaviour can expect appropriate action by police. All evidence will be used … to help identify those involved, including social media posts,” the spokesman said.

A bloodied football fan at the Wests Tigers v South Sydney game at Campbelltown Stadium in May. Picture: Channel 9

President of North West Sydney Football Referees Association Tom Emeleus has been a referee for 36 years and said the number of incidents had not decreased since the Fair Play program began.

“We lose half our first-year referees every year. That statistic has not changed for 20 years,” Mr Emeleus said.

“You would not scream at a 13-year-old in a shopping centre, but put a referee’s jersey on them and it seems they are fair game.

“I think you get people bringing pressures from other aspects of their life onto the sporting field. Sport is a high-pressure, competitive environment where those other pressures can come into play.”

A man was charged following a brawl at an under-12s rugby league game in Sydney. Picture: 7News

It comes after spectators and officials came to blows last Sunday during the second half of the Rugby League Central Coast first-grade fixture at MacKillop Oval.

Footage obtained by this masthead shows a pair tussling on the sidelines before others run in, with punches thrown and play paused for five minutes as the altercation unfolded.

No reports were made to NSW Police, but the incident was referred to the NSW Rugby League, which is investigating.

A spokesman at the NSW Office of Sport said it had pumped $500,000 into the Sport NSW-run Fair Play Network since 2023 to run de-escalation programs and the Shoosh for Kids campaign to moderate sideline behaviour at children’s sport.

Soccer refs like Daniel Emeleus (l to r), Daniel Rafferty, Tom Emeleus, Daniel Lambert and Ben Lambert are often the targets of abuse from parents and player. Picture: Jeremy Piper

Sport NSW chief executive Stuart Hodge said there was a zero-tolerance approach to abuse and violence, and offenders faced significant sanctions.

“There are approximately 1.8 million registered participants in community sport across NSW. When you add parents, family members and other spectators, millions of people engage with community sport each week. In that context, the number of behavioural incidents that occur is extremely low and not reflective of the broader sporting community,“ he said.

“It’s important to recognise that some incidents that take place at community sporting events are not caused by sport itself. These are societal issues that occasionally play out in sporting environments.”

Resolution Education director Nathan McDonald runs occupational violence training for government, business and sporting bodies and agrees the problem is widespread.

“It is worse since covid because people have forgotten how to behave,” Mr McDonald said. “People are getting angry and not being called out on their behaviour right across society.

“Society is getting softer and softer on behavioural issues. People are afraid to call out their kids and it is going to keep getting worse until we fix that,” he said.

Soccer referee Warren Kinny, former president of the Granville District Football Referees Association, said the figures on sporting incidents increasing “does not surprise me at all”.

“Nothing has changed, I didn’t even know there was an initiative in place,” he said.

“There was an incident a couple of years ago where there was an assault on a referee. It made the news and there were a couple of weeks of respect to referees but it quickly fell away.”

Mr Kinny said the problem was made worse by the tribal culture in soccer in particular, and fuelled by a lack of respect for match officials and the rules of the game from top-tier players, managers and commentators. It could be fixed from the top down.

“When the associations take a serious approach to assaults with proper punishments that affect the team, such as a team losing points, then it can reinforce positive behaviour on the field and on the sidelines,” he said.

Tom Truelove, with his son Mason, says there is no place in community sport for violence. Picture: Jeremy Piper

NSW Rugby League Referees Association executive officer Greg McCallum said the code had seen a noticeable improvement in on- and off-field behaviour in the past two years, which started with the example set at the top of the NRL.

“We are bucking the trend in the last couple of years,” Mr McCallum said. “It is not down to one thing but a lot of different things.

“Education of people, spectators at the ground, we have identification for young referees who are starting off, they wear a bib and different colour socks to identify them as new to the game, and wear a jersey cam on the front of their jerseys.

“It’s not one major thing, it is all these little things that help.”

Tom Truelove has been involved in the North West Sydney Football competition for almost 30 years and believes violence has no place in the sport.

“You come to soccer and sport in general for a bit of fun, you don’t want that.” Mr Truelove said. “It is not what sport is about at all.”

As the father of a keen player, Mr Truelove said he was aware of the growing number of violence-related incidents and that he must educate his kids around the safety and gamesmanship of sport: “It is always going to happen in sport, it is just about how to deal with it and to teach them the right way of going about things.”

Mr Truelove said he didn’t want football being overshadowed by violence.

“I’ve been playing soccer since I was five, I have always loved the camaraderie and the team aspect of the game, now bringing the kids down and kicking the ball around is great,” he said.

Originally published as Referees call for more to be done to prevent increasing abuse and violence on pitches and sidelines