EXCLUSIVE Ex-Premier League referee Jeff Winter says VAR has created a ‘powderkeg’ of anger towards officials after yet another weekend of shameful dissent and bad behaviour by top-flight players and managers

• Mail Sport has launched a major campaign to stamp out abuse at all levels
• Winter was a Premier League referee for a decade but fears for officials today
• Have you witnessed abuse of referees? Contact [email protected] 

Jeff Winter knows how it feels to be in the eye of the storm.

A Premier League referee for a decade, he took charge of some of English football’s most tempestuous fixtures and was never afraid to give a bit back to mouthy players.

He has spoken previously about how, as a new top-flight official, three Manchester United players surrounded him in a test of mettle as Alex Ferguson snarled from the sidelines.

Winter brandished three yellow cards for dissent and was never bothered again.

But he doesn’t envy the officials of today, when bookings serve as zero deterrent and VAR has created what he describes as a ‘powderkeg’ of anger and frustration which endangers officials at all levels of the game.

Jeff Winter took charge of some of football’s fieriest contests  and is seen holding back Gary Neville after the Manchester United defender ‘headbutted’ Steve McManaman of Manchester City in a derby FA Cup tie in 2004

Winter says he doesn’t envy modern day officials whose every decision is scrutinised by VAR

Arsenal boss Mikel Arteta was again booked for dissent during his side’s win over Brighton

Mail Sport has launched a campaign to stop the abuse of referees at all levels of the game

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It comes after a Premier League weekend in which Arsenal manager Mikel Arteta received his fourth booking for dissent this season, Manchester United’s Diogo Dalot was sent off for the same reason and Brentford vs Aston Villa concluded with more cards than on the average mantelpiece right now.

Last week saw a shocking incident in Turkey when the president of top-flight club Ankaragucu punched referee Halil Umut Meler in the face and fractured his eye socket.

As Mail Sport’s ‘Stop Abusing Referees’ campaign continues to highlight, those high-profile incidents are just the tip of the iceberg.

Winter believes the problem has grown infinitely worse since the introduction of video technology a few years back and the 24-7 chatter around football on television and social media only fans the flames.

‘I blame everything on the ills of VAR because everyone is frustrated. All the players, all the management, the referees are all frustrated by it,’ he tells Mail Sport.

‘We have players and managers at the top of their profession, referees certainly with tons of experience, and all of a sudden VAR comes along and everyone is left scratching their heads.

‘If you’re a referee, you’ve got to the top level and all of a sudden they start chopping and changing what you’ve been doing for the last 5, 10 or 15 years.

Winter believed the advent of VAR has created a ‘powderkeg’ of anger and frustration among players and managers, which is adversely affecting officials 

He believed VAR is undermining officials be ‘re-refereeing’ their original decisions 

The moment that the fist of Faruk Koca, president of Turkish Super Lig club Ankaragucu, connects with the face of referee Halil Umut Meler, fracturing his eye socket

Meler fell to the floor after the punch and was subsequently taken to hospital  

‘Fans are in stadiums not knowing what the hell is going on and it’s like a powderkeg that’s ready to burst and unfortunately it’s now simmering and is the worst still to come?

‘We need to have a stop button and a reset button with football because if you throw everything into the mix, it’s not a nice place for a referee at the moment.’

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When Winter was a top-flight official between 1995 and 2004, there was no VAR official at Stockley Park passing judgement on all his decisions and no microphone recording his every interaction with players and managers.

While Winter says VAR does have a useful role for certain incidents missed by the officials – citing Thierry Henry’s infamous handball against the Republic of Ireland in 2009 – he believes things have gone too far.

‘Unfortunately in football, booing the referee and disagreeing with their decisions when they go against your team are part and parcel. I don’t see that ever changing.

‘But it’s the degree of it and now we have mass hysteria, players crowding officials and this ridiculous situation of the man who’s supposed to be in charge stood in the middle of the pitch tapping his ear and everyone standing for sometimes five minutes clueless as to what’s going on.

‘The referee isn’t in charge. I’m sick and tired of hearing this statement, ‘we don’t want VAR to re-referee the game’ but that’s exactly what is happening.

‘We are re-refereeing every single decision in the penalty area and all you’re doing is transferring the decision-making from the ref to somebody in a booth telling the referee to go and look at a screen.

Winter guides Millwall’s Dennis Wise away from Man United’s Gary Neville and Cristiano Ronaldo during the 2004 FA Cup final

The official gets a mouthful from Leeds United midfielder Lee Bowyer at Arsenal in 2001

Winter responded to the torrent of abuse by sending Bowyer off at Highbury

‘I can only then imagine the conversations that are going on after VAR overturns a decisions.

‘The next decisions that referee makes, he is bound to have players in his ear shouting ‘are you sure, ref, you got the last one wrong’.’

Winter fears there is a direct link between pundits criticising referees in television and radio studios and the incidents of violence in the grassroots game that are driving officials away from the sport.

‘On Sunday for Liverpool vs Man United, we have radio presenters berating Michael Oliver, ‘Well, you know what he is like, always want to be the centre of attention, throws the cards around…’

‘We see on Match of the Day pundits like Ian Wright screaming ‘pathetic, pathetic’ over decisions on the pitch.

‘All these seeds are being sown in the minds of parents who then go and watch their sons’ games the following morning and are shouting abuse at the referee.

‘Maybe it was ‘pathetic’, maybe it was a poor decision but this euphoria that is being created does unfortunately lead to the animosity that saw a referee assaulted at the highest level of professional football in Turkey and sadly happens on parks around the country – our country – every weekend.’

Winter was speaking on behalf of online betting community OLBG.com  

Manchester City’s Erling Haaland screams in the face of referee Simon Hooper this month

WINTER ON THE WEEKEND’S CONTROVERSIES

Diogo Dalot’s red card for dissent (Liverpool vs Manchester United)

Watching the video it didn’t seem like he’d said something. The incident the other week with the Brighton player Lewis Dunk, he’d been cautioned and then said something abusive. So that was understandable.

On this one, it just seemed to be the visible show of dissent with him throwing his arms and the histrionics, which he repeated a second or so later.

You’d think when you’ve got to the 93rd-minute of what is always a very tasty affair and everything is in order, it did seem strange.

But we don’t know what’s gone on during the 90 minutes and whether the referee is totally sick and tired of him.

I remember sending the West Ham player John Moncur off in the FA Cup, a yellow followed by a second yellow and red all in the same incident, so it’s not unheard of.

Diogo Dalot was infuriated when a throw-in decision went against Man United at Liverpool

Michael Oliver showed a yellow card and then a red to Dalot in quick succession afterwards 

Mikel Arteta booked for the fourth time this season (Arsenal vs Brighton)

He has been charged, he’s been put in the stands and the first game back, he is running up and down his technical area screaming for a player to be shown a yellow card.

Behaviour is getting worse. The trouble with a yellow card nowadays is they’re like confetti, being thrown around willy-nilly and they’re not working.

If you look back to the laws of football, the purpose of a yellow card is a caution, a final warning that tells the player or manager ‘any more of that and you’re going to be dismissed.’

But the deterrent is not working and the punishment isn’t working, so where do we go next?

Arsenal manager Mikel Arteta coaches from the stands at Villa Park while serving a suspension

IT’S ALL KICKING OFF! 

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‘Pantomime’ at the end of Brentford vs Aston Villa

Match of the Day put a graphic up. 72 minutes, there had been only one yellow card in the game. At the end, the total was 12 yellow cards, two reds and the game ending in absolute stupidity.

They had two senior pundits [Alan Shearer and Ian Wright] laughing and saying they thought it was funny because it was ‘pantomime’.

But the behaviour of the player was absolutely abysmal, they were feigning injury, they’re diving around like Mike Tyson had given you one on the jaw. It was an absolute farce.

The players lost it, big time, and what can the authorities do with that game?

They can charge both clubs with failure to control their players, a financial penalty that in the financial playground of the Premier League is a slap on the wrist and away we go to next week.

Brentford vs Aston Villa descended into farce with a flurry of yellow and red cards 

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