View From The Field: Ward’s Words (Helen Ward column)

Helen Ward opens with the distance travelled: when she signed for Arsenal in January 2009 she was at the best club in the country and training twice a week, and she now trains three times a week at Watford, two divisions below the top. Her argument is that the progress has left one thing behind. Full-time professional players, she writes, should be officiated by referees of the same standing, and she is careful not to blame the officials themselves, who are not professionals. Instead she does the sums: one professional league of twelve clubs means a maximum of six games at any one time, so funding 10 to 12 professional referees ought to be within reach given the investment flowing into the game. The Reading handball penalty against Manchester United is, she says, the tip of the iceberg.