2:49pm Thursday 30th November 2006
By Andy Cryer
ANDY CRYER catches up with Val Stockley, one of Wiltshire's few female referees.
"WOMEN have to pass through the same system to become referees as men do so any notion there is any bias towards female officials coming through the ranks is simply untrue."
Next time Luton Town boss Mike Newell wants to display his old-fashioned sexist attitudes maybe he should consider the above views of one of Wiltshire's few female referees.
Val Stockley has been officiating men's football for the past 18 years and, like many others, she took offence to Newell's scathing attack towards assistant referee Amy Rayner in a recent defeat to QPR.
Newell said allowing women to officiate games was "tokenism - for the politically-correct idiots," but Stockley insists it is actually harder for them to be given the whistle.
She said: "I don't believe there is any bias one way or the other. In fact it is possibly harder for us because all the fitness tests are the same.
"You never see men run against women in athletics but we have to do exactly the same to qualify as referees. We have no problem with that but to suggest we have it easier is just not true.
"Mike Newell has just made himself look like a fool. Maybe that is the attitude of people who have been in the game of football for a long time, it was one the FA shared in the past."
Newell's comments came after Rayner failed to award his side, what he believed, was a penalty in their 3-2 defeat.
"We have a problem in this country with political correctness," he said. "Bringing women into the game is not the way to prove refereeing and officialdom.
"It is bad enough with the incapable referees and linesmen we have but if you start bringing in women, you have big problems."
The Luton boss has since apologised and Stockley believes he was just looking for a scapegoat.
She said: "Players, managers and officials make mistakes. Players probably make 20 times the mistakes we do but ours are the ones that get highlighted.
"People get personal towards officials and that really gets on my nerves."
Stockley, 51, of Wootton Bassett, qualified as a referee in 1989 and she believes on the local scene attitudes towards females in football have improved.
She said: "It is not as bad as it was. To be honest teams are so happy to have a referee nowadays in local football they don't make the remarks they used to.
"So maybe attitudes have improved out of necessity. I don't even think of myself as a female referee, I am just a referee.
"I know Wendy Toms quite well, because I used to play football against her, and I thought attitudes like Mike Newell's had gone from the game."
Stockley got involved with refereeing when one of her friends was looking for an official for one his side's matches.
She said: "A friend of mine managed an under-12 side. He was a referee but did not want to ref his own team's games and so got me to do it.
"It all went from there really. I did my course at Cirencester and came through the ranks from there. I started in youth football and then started doing men's football.
Stockley, who also coaches the Swindon Spitfires girls and ladies team, admits there are days when she considers packing it all in, but that goes for all officials.
She said: "There are days when you have people shouting at you when you think is this worth it?
"But then you get two good teams and it keeps you going. I will stop doing it when I don't think I am up to it.
"At the moment I am confident I can do just a good a job as a man."
She is one of six active female officials in Wiltshire with County FA secretary Mike Benson urging more to step forward.
He said: "Mike Newell's comments did not do the game any good, but at least he has apologised.
"Our ultimate aim is to encourage more women to become officials, especially so they can referee women's football more. At the moment you hardly get any women refereeing women's football and that does need to be changed."
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