Why Russian football needs a foreign head of referees

Dmitry Egorov - that Dyukov's decision looks logical, no matter how much he is criticized.

Football referees in Russia will now be managed by Hungarian Viktor Kaszsály and Russian Sergey Fursa. Although controversial, it is a logical decision by RFU head Alexander Dyukov. And no offense to our other referees, but they themselves have eaten each other up, having lost their strength and trust.

In general, we live in such a time in football, when there is no point in dwelling on personalities. Personally, I may like Alexander Egorov, someone else - Nikolai Levnikov, a third - Valentin Ivanov. Maybe someone will like Mr. Budogossky. But the problem is not whether they are good performers, honest comrades and talented craftsmen - it is simply that they are all ultimately the heads of one Russian refereeing monster. A monster whose heads will never stop framing and disfiguring each other. And so - at all stages of a strong and unchanging system.

It is easiest to judge this system on the basis of my own examples. Mine are from the lowest stage of evolution, from the 4th Russian league.

The first one is from 10 years ago, when I had to run into the penalty box and fall down, knowing that a penalty would definitely be given. Because of that, the players of our team received 500 rubles in bonuses for the first, second and reserve teams. By the way, it would be interesting to look into the archives and find out who of those novice referees made it to the RPL, except that the statistic is not that it was not kept - it was simply not kept.

Years later, reforms, dismissals, and the appointment of new leaders did not change much. My second example comes from recent history. A team agreed with the referee and the opponent on the desired result, but came to the game as a team. It is impossible to play soccer in such a team, so one of the fans signed up under someone else's name, got a uniform and spent the whole match in "Carlo Pasolini" shoes. And it was possible because in England matches of this level are often broadcast on cable TV, and we do not even have amateur reviews on YouTube. And that's another misfortune, because our football still resembles an area without security cameras, where you can do whatever you want without fear of being noticed.

Again, without going into personalities, it is pointless to trust such a system, even to bet on its best representatives. So, the most appropriate decision of the manager is to appoint an independent, status professional, as well as his own person, in whom you do not doubt.

Everything is clear with the Hungarian Kashshai - he has worked at top matches of various tournaments and is mentally close to Russia, but very far from any clans.

His influence will be limited by "his" Sergei Fursa, who has earned Dyukov's favor through his years of work at Zenit. Yes, the St. Petersburg man will once again make decisions, create cooperatives and surround himself with cronies, but unlike the rest of the former referees, the new head of the RFU can at least be fully trusted.

By the way, I also had a story with Fursa. One day I was standing in the Petrovsky Mixtape area, pointing my camera towards the back room of the stadium where the players were arguing about something, but at that moment it was Fursa who grabbed me by the arm and pulled me back. Well, there is hope that he will be just as eager to shut the mouths of particularly insatiable and dangerous monster heads.

So Dyukov's decisions on referees are absolutely clear. But the question of his motivation remains. Who does he want to be: a lobbyist, an influential fan of one of the teams, or a man who really wants to change our football? If it is the latter, then Zenit will be judged even more harshly than other clubs.

We, accepting Fursa and Kashyai, can only demand transparency in the system of evaluation and appointment of referees and hope that we will believe in referees, at least in football. Russia has to start somewhere.

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