RateTheRef

Well, the inclusion of Joe Worrall would boost any group into the very highest category !

I am not really qualified to compare but the era of the 1970s which saw Englishmen Jack Taylor, Pat Partridge, David Smith, Norman Burtenshaw, Bob Matthewson holding FIFA badges was none too shabby either. It may be that they weren't all concurrent holders of the badge. Without my Upton I cannot check and my copy of Upton seems to have got mislaid. I suspect dirty work at the crossroads from Mrs Whistleblower but she avers her innocence of the crime of theft.

On their day, Dagnall, Finney and McCabe were top-notch FIFA refs, but McCabe (in particular) did not acquit himself well at the World Cup finals in England in 1966.

Hackett ambled around the pitch in slow motion....

I agree with ReadingFan... that certainly is a strong line up... plus Wiley was around albeit without a badge.

Oh and Grandad Walton....

Just in case any of you were wondering, and I realise it may have spoilt your Christmas remaining in a state of uncertainty, that which was lost has been found and I am now in possession of my Upton once more. I have had to exonerate Mrs Whistleblower from all culpability and have offered a full judicial pardon which, strangely enough, doesn't seem to ameliorate her sense of faux hurt at being wrongly ( as she claims ) accused. A trip to the jewellers may have to be undertaken. Quite how the volume managed to find its way down the back of a bookcase i am not sure but no watertight case can be made with a lack of hard evidence.

So I have been able to look up the 1970s refereeing luminaries I mentioned in a previous post.  The first years of the 1970s saw all these referees active at the highest level but as Upton does not list FIFA designation ( an appendix project anyone ? ) I cannot be sure that they all were on the FIFA List at  the time time but I think it's highly likely that they were.

Whistleblower: "Just in case any of you were wondering, and I realise it may have spoilt your Christmas remaining in a state of uncertainty, that which was lost has been found and I am now in possession of my Upton once more. I have had to exonerate Mrs Whistleblower from all culpability and have offered a full judicial pardon which, strangely enough, doesn't seem to ameliorate her sense of faux hurt at being wrongly ( as she claims ) accused. A trip to the jewellers may have to be undertaken. Quite how the volume managed to find its way down the back of a bookcase i am not sure but no watertight case can be made with a lack of hard evidence".

So you're not buying her a copy of Jeff Winter's "Who's the B*****d in the Black" as recompense then WB?! 

AT  I have been known to skate on thin ice in my time...but not that thin !  Mrs W did once pick up and give a cursory reading of Referee !   David Elleray's autobiography which she came upon in the house but I think it was more Oxford and Harrow which interested her rather than Elleray's exploits on the pitch. A old friend of hers was a contemporary of Elleray at Hertford College, though this friend ( nor a footballing type at all ) claims barely to remember Elleray from their time together there.

I agree with the comment about Joe Worrall

Sadly though the inclusion of Keith Hackett has the precise opposite effect

Never was a truer word spoken.

Quote from: Whistleblower on Wed 16 Dec 2020 20:16

Quote from: PhiltheRef on Wed 16 Dec 2020 20:06

I agree with the comment about Joe Worrall

Sadly though the inclusion of Keith Hackett has the precise opposite effect

Never was a truer word spoken.

In the words of Mr Gilbert, "What, never?"

Well, hardly ever.