RateTheRef

Quote from: bmb on Sun 05 Jul 2020 15:41

Going to be interesting to see how they manage it. A lot of countries still have travel restrictions, including mandatory 14 day self isolation on arrival (for whatever reason).

If they have to fly out a team of referees 2 weeks in advance so they can do the 14 days self isolation and then those referees have to do 14 days self isolation on their return to their respective home countries that is going to cause all manner of issues. Our 20/21 season commences 2nd Aug for the NBII and 15th Aug for the NBI & there is a strict 14 days self isolation period on return. I wonder if exceptions will be made/agreed?

The spread of dates is close

8/9/10/11 August: Preliminary round
18/19 August: First qualifying round
25/26 August: Second qualifying round

Presumably any quarantines that applied to referees would also apply to players, and if you have that many 14 day quarantines European/international football won't be possible at all!

I don't think quarantines are likely to generally affect football at the top level.

It will be interesting to see who is used in August for the remainder of EL/CL. The QFs/SFs will only be 1 leg so fewer officials will be required than normal. Some high-profile referees are from leagues that haven't returned (Kuipers, Turpin, Makkelie, etc) and the German league has finished already so some officials might be more up to match speed than others. It will also be interesting ot see if the likes of Kuipers and Brych carry on next season or stop, at least at UEFA level.

I would assume they have already addressed any quarantine issues but you never know! The travel rules & restrictions may well have significantly changed by then anyway. I know in Hungary there are different rules for travelling by private plane than there are for travelling on commercial flights so one way around it for our Federation could be to fly any of our teams & referees on Mr Csányi's company private jet.

The FIFA list runs from 01 Jan - 31 Dec not season to season so there shouldn't be any changes to the current list. Maybe some promotions/demotions in July but no-one leaving/joining. Kassai retired on 05 Jan but will still show on the elite list officially until 31 Dec! Crazy!!

The German league has only just finished, like ours in Hungary, so the referees & any teams should still be fit - they've not had time to eat too many ice creams on their break yet! Ours is a very short break 2-3 weeks before the pre-season starts again so doubt any of them will relax that much in terms of training. The UEFA summer camp is being done via zoom though and normally the refs have their fitness test at it so wonder also how that will work. Common sense would be for one of the UEFA observers from their own country to supervise the fitness test being carried out in their own country.