Referee Scheduling

As anyone who has been involved in tournament organising knows, scheduling is the worst part of setting everything up. Even once you've worked out the best ways to get all your teams playing on the number of pitches available, without too many back-to-backs, you have referees to sort. The optimum is a head referee, three assistants, a snitch referee, a snitch, two goal referees, a scorekeeper, and a timekeeper - that's ten individuals! You have to make sure that no-one is scheduled more than once (including as players), and that no-one has a conflict of interest; something which has become more difficult to manage now everyone seems to have played for two or even three teams across the seasons. Throughout the season there have been several approaches, finishing with the best organised event I was a part of, World Cup. Here I will discuss what I feel are the best approaches in an ideal world, and how I currently would deal with the compromises necessary.

Starting with World Cup, this year's event ran incredibly smoothly. Even with 45 minute gameslots, which have sounded death knells for European tournaments recently, games started promptly and with full teams. Part of the reason I feel it was so successful was the introduction of standby referee teams - a full team of qualified referees ready to slot in on any of the four pitches if someone was late. Though they had the advantage of having almost exclusively non-playing referees available, I still didn't expect everything to go as punctually and I was more than pleasantly surprised. If every tournament had a set of referees who knew they should make themselves available to the tournament committee at a specific location before every match slot, finding replacements would go far swifter. For the past two BQCs I did create lists of free referees, but they were scattered across the tournament location and thus it was not as effective as what happened at World Cup. I filled one standby slot at World Cup, on the first day, and after not being needed could get on with spectating for that slot - it was hardly an inconvenience.

Going forward in international country-level competitions, I feel that quidditch could learn from other sports. Often, countries assemble full referee teams which then stay together for an entire tournament, and are then available as a unit for the schedulers. This could work for the next World Cup or even European Games - the UK, for example, should easily be able to provide two full referee teams, perhaps both with two snitches. The best referees are likely to all be head referee qualified, so the team could rotate who filled that role. Smaller, less developed countries could team up to provide a unit. This could be used in conjunction with the previous idea of standby referee teams (though I feel standbys should be used more widely than international competition), by replacing whole teams if a component is missing. Having set teams of referees could also be an advantage to players as well, who are more likely to know what to expect from referee teams later in a competition if they have been under them before, rather than having variables that effect the overall quality of the refereeing.

But back to domestic, club competitions where it isn't practical to require clubs to provide full teams. I have scheduled the referees for the last two BQCs, and I worked on a few parameters. Generally speaking, referees would not be involved in games that were affecting their group (if they were players). In an ideal world, this would extend to clubs - though that becomes a little restrictive and is the first of the rules to waive. Secondly, close games are identified and at least two strong referees are assigned to those. Again ideally all games would be refereed with equal quality, but we do not have enough referees in this country certainly to achieve that parity, so the anticipated 'hardest' matches are given the best referees. Care should be taken, however, to not leave a full team of inexperienced referees without someone more confident to guide them if necessary. The difference between the best and worst referee teams during group stages should be minimal. Finally, referees should have an appropriate number of breaks. Some referees like being on their feet all day - I'm one of them - whereas others, particularly those competing for the top teams, prefer not to run themselves ragged. Obviously this is only possible if you have enough referees!

I have a database set up which I use for my scheduling (nicknamed 'Fordsheed') and has been very helpful in sorting everything out relatively quickly. It works by giving every referee an entry, which then links to their team, and what positions they are willing to fill. The team schedule is then created, which links team availability to their timeslot. Then, for each timeslot, I can search for the available referees of each position and use that to fill up the schedule with confidence that no-one is in two places at once. Just to check, I have an error sheet which shows up anyone who has been assigned twice. The long list of numbers then generates the schedule, and can also be used to create individual schedules and lists of free individuals. Generally I will work methodically by position, starting with head referees and snitches, then matching snitch referees to the snitches, and trying to find complimentary assistant referees to finish the qualified team. I've also used it to assign goal referees, scorekeepers, and timekeepers, as well as other tournament volunteers. Unfortunately it isn't terribly user-friendly as a system, or I would've lent it out to people!

Scheduling for the first day is one thing, scheduling for knockout play is another thing completely. You can't predict it, you don't know which teams and therefore which conflicts of interest are going to be present at each round, and you might even have two brackets to deal with simultaneously. It isn't fun. This is where the referee team system has an advantage, because if Australia are playing Spain at the World Cup then all you need to do is pick a referee team that isn't from Australia or Spain. There's no need to individually pick up to 10 people from a potentially huge list. At this year's World Cup, every round was preceded by a referee meeting where the officials were picked, and this worked well - but mainly, I feel, because referees were not distracted by being with their teams as they might be in a domestic tournament. It could probably be effective in a fantasy tournament though, where there is not so much of a team bond. So generally I'd advise having one or two individuals on the tournament committee who aren't playing, and can be solely dedicated to sorting out referee schedules for each round as they come. This requires a bit more time, and still means the referees need to gather to have this communicated to them, but they don't have to be there for as long. It probably does necessitate a longer gameslot though, to have time to accrue the results and then sort who is refereeing.

Then, of course, there are the finals. Who do you pick? How do you tell them? Generally from the quarter finals onwards, the pool of referees is restricted to the best. This pool should be made of those who have been consistent, both across the season and across the tournament - stand-out new referees should always be considered if they have shone out to other referees and to teams. Checking with captains is a good way to eliminate referees who have disappointed across multiple games, and also checking with the top referees who may have worked with multiple groups across the weekend. But the most important thing to check with, particularly for finals, is the referees themselves. Some may not be comfortable with stepping into the role for a final, or maybe they want to just spectate the match. If you don't give them a chance to reject, and they feel forced into it, it could seriously affect their ability to perform and the likelihood of them refereeing again. Ultimately, they are still volunteers, and should be excited and happy about the prospect of being involved. This means asking them individually, and not shaming them if they say no - and maybe offering them a lower position in the referee team if available. This should go for everyone on pitch, right down to the goal referees (following the tradition now that everyone on the pitch is head referee qualified, some may not be as pleased as I was to stand behind the hoops for a game). Respect is key!

I could go into much more detail on everything here, but to summarise: standby referee teams are a great thing I feel we should try and introduce; country-based referee teams could work wonderfully for European Games and World Cup; referees should be chosen to minimise conflict of interest and maximise parity across all games; technology is good at helping if you check it for 40 hours; assigning referees in bracket play requires dedicated volunteers; referees for finals should be chosen for their performance consistency and requested respectfully. Oh, and we could all do with more non-playing referees, always.