Yes they were

By Unnamed Sauce7/2 22:04Sat Feb 7 22:04:25 2026In response to Re: Clinical

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Very loudly and very intrusively. (I suspect one was mentoring the other). I did try to have a friendly chat with them before the start, but they were obviously very important and much more intelligent than I am so I shut up.

The most common phrase they used was "at this level" as if to excuse any mistakes or errors being made. I found that insulting and tbf any level of football played and/or the ability of the players competing has nothing to do at all with how you interpret the laws (or rules) of the game. I think they were perhaps advocating "making allowances" because this was UCL. Which is pants. A potential leg breaker is just that. In the Euros or at The Griff.

The second most popular comment was "50/50 ball" which they used to justify their own assessment when they'd missed something. They would make great VAR officials.

They seemed impressed that the officials "let the game flow" and generally I would agree with that. They did.

As you know, I empathise greatly with referees. :-) Out of ten I'd give today's a seven. I did not know what the late booking was for and neither did the assessors. Happy to be enlightened though. ( I'm sure I will be).

I thought today's officials did ok tbf. Only criticism I would make is that in the second half the ref (correctly) waved advantage after a reckless foul (a foot left in as a challenge studded one of our players). Our attack came to nothing which is fair enough but I thought he might have trotted over after that and just wagged a "no more of that please" finger at the culprit.