El árbitro del fútbol base (The youth football referee)
MCER B2376 palabras
Andrés Puig has refereed youth football for twenty years. In his regional association, seven out of every ten new referees give it up before the end of their first season. We spoke to him in a car park, half an hour before a match for twelve-year-olds.
Q: Seven out of ten. What happens to them?
A: The story people expect is that they cannot stand the shouting. The shouting is real, and I will not pretend otherwise. The ones who leave, though, are almost never the ones who had a terrible afternoon. They had an ordinary afternoon, went home, and found that nobody had anything to say to them.
Q: Nobody from the club?
A: Nobody from anywhere. You referee your first match at sixteen, alone, in a town you have never seen, with two sets of parents behind you who have known each other for years. Then you get changed in your car and drive home. Nobody is waiting to tell you what you got right.
Q: Are they not trained for that?
A: They get a course, an exam and a whistle. The course teaches you the laws of the game. It cannot teach you what to do when a coach walks along the touchline asking, very politely, whether you would care to explain your decision to the parents. That part you learn while it is happening, in public, at seventeen.
Q: And the pay?
A: Thirty euros, minus the petrol, and your Saturday is gone. Nobody starts for the money, but the money is what they mention when they resign: it is the only reason that sounds reasonable out loud.
Q: So what keeps the other three?
A: An older referee who phones them on the Monday. That is not my theory; it is what they tell me. We tried pairing beginners with experienced referees twice, and both times we had to stop, because it takes people and there are never enough people.
Q: And today?
A: Today there is a girl of seventeen doing her fourth match. I have arranged to be here, on the touchline, in my coat. Whatever happens, we are having a coffee afterwards and I will tell her the two things she did well. It takes twenty minutes.
Palabras que quizá no conozcas
- refereeárbitro, árbitra
- to give something updejarlo, abandonar
- shoutinglos gritos, la bronca
- to get changedcambiarse de ropa
- whistlesilbato
- the laws of the gamelas reglas del juego
- coachentrenador, entrenadora
- touchlinela banda, la línea de banda
- petrolgasolina
- to resignrenunciar, dejar el arbitraje
Preguntas
Se contestan con el texto delante. No es memoria: es entender.
According to Andrés, which new referees usually leave?
The ones who went home from an ordinary match and heard nothing from anyone — Andrés descarta lo que esperaríamos: casi nunca son los de la tarde horrible. Son los que tuvieron una tarde corriente y no encontraron a nadie que les dijera nada al volver.
Andrés denies that new referees are shouted at.
False — Falso: dice justo lo contrario, «The shouting is real, and I will not pretend otherwise». Lo que niega es que los gritos sean la causa de que lo dejen.
New referees are given a course, an exam and a ___.
whistle — «They get a course, an exam and a whistle». La lista es corta a propósito: es todo lo que reciben antes de arbitrar solos.
What does the detail of getting changed in the car mainly tell us about a new referee's first match?
That there is nowhere at the ground that belongs to the new referee — El texto no lo explica, lo muestra: llegas solo, te cambias en el coche y te vas. El campo es de los demás; el árbitro novato no tiene sitio propio en él.
Why is the pay the reason people give when they stop refereeing?
Because it is the only reason that sounds acceptable to other people — Él mismo lo distingue: nadie empieza por el dinero, pero el dinero es lo que se dice al marcharse, porque es la única razón que suena razonable en voz alta.
Why does Andrés end the interview by describing his plan for the seventeen-year-old?
Because he is doing on his own, for one referee, what the association could not keep going — El plan de emparejar novatos con veteranos se probó dos veces y las dos se paró: «it takes people and there are never enough people». Lo que cuenta al final es eso mismo por su cuenta y para una sola persona: estar en la banda, el café y las dos cosas que hizo bien.