Monsieur Salut writes: Salut! Sunderland often asks ‘Who are You?’ interviewees to share their views on the best and worst referees in the Premier League. Mark Clattenburg is the one most commonly named as the best and, for all that he’s a Mag, I agree. Experience has also taught me to be as understanding as most of the pressures on match officials. I criticise bad decisions and inconsistency but am the first the recognise that players make many more bad decisions, and show much greater inconsistency.
In one of the occasional guest pieces we receive from a football academic, Tom Webb, we learn that pundits generally are also more restrained in their assessments of refs than is supposed. It is worth noting that many ex-referees – Graham Poll, Howard Webb and Dermot Gallagher spring to mind – now provide their services to the media as expert assessors …