I was listening to Jimmy Magee hosting Take Your Point on RTÉ Radio a couple of Sunday evenings ago, and it was interesting to hear that many of the listeners who'd texted and called the programme were giving out about the performances of various referees across that weekend's Championship football and hurling games.
It occurred to me that a high percentage of viewers who contact us at MNS, also want to vent their spleen about what they perceive to be similarly inept match officials.
Who'd be a referee, or possibly even worse, a referee's assistant? (I still prefer the term linesmen, and in fairness they've been called an awful lot worse).
At least the referee can stick fairly close to the centre of the pitch and are so caught up in the game that they probably don't hear a lot of the abuse raining down on them from the stands and terraces, but the poor linos have no option.
The close proximity of the touchline to the stands means they hear every shout questioning their parentage, or their favourite method of relaxation.
They hardly do it for the money, although the extra few bob they get can't be sniffed at in the current financial circumstances. The scrutiny they're under has probably never been keener either.
With cameras at every Premier Division game for MNS, if the ref makes a howler, it's going to be broadcast to the nation and beyond for all to see, including the top brass in the FAI.
I'm going to take a deep breath before the next sentence. I know many fans will think I must be losing my marbles, but I think that the refereeing has improved this season compared to previous campaigns.
There. I've said it.
Mind you, we had the situation this week where it looked like Cork City were awarded a soft penalty against Bray Wanderers, and a couple of the red cards brandished over the weekend probably fall into the harsh category, and Drogheda United fans are still very peeved at the amount of injury time played at United Park, which allowed Bohs snatch a late equaliser.
However, I would still maintain that the overall standard of officiating here has got better.
(Spare a thought for one viewer who e-mailed us about a one euro bet they had on Drogheda to win 1-0 and James Chambers to be the goalscorer at 150-1. That Bohemians equaliser really hurt!)
It was very nice to see Alan Kelly take charge of the Rangers versus Paris St Germain tie at the Emirates over the weekend, and he came through the game with flying colours.
Needless to say, a pre-season friendly will never be played with the same intensity as a league match or European tie, but despite that Alan looked very at home on the big stage, and hopefully he'll see more action when the UEFA Champions League continues.
It strikes me that one of the ways we can see more people get involved in refereeing here is if they see Irish officials getting big gigs in Europe and on the international stage.
Of course I'll probably want to delete the last four or five paragraphs the next time I'm at a match and the referee has a stinker. But it's worth remembering that the referees do operate under a system of scrutiny and if they do have that proverbial 'stinker' they can be dropped just like a player who has under-performed.
Ask Graham Poll, who memorably awarded three yellow cards to the Croatian Josip Simunic in the World Cup finals in 2006, and never really recovered from it, retiring soon after.
Perhaps that's the one thing supporters would like to see more often in the league here. It's pretty rare that a referee is given an enforced 'holiday' after a really bad performance, and although we would expect the referees' inspectors to cut their colleagues some slack, when a man in black (or blue, yellow, green and red these days) has made a number of bad decisions in a game, or maybe for a second game in a row, then he should be forced to sit out the next week's series of matches.
If you agree or totally disagree with me about the standard of refereeing improving here, feel free to e-mail us; mns@rte.ie will find us 24/7, but hopefully you won't call me the sort of names that you call referees and linesmen/women on a regular basis at your local ground.
Incidentally, we received an e-mail straight after the programme asking about my comment about supporters being locked out at Tallaght Stadium when some empty seats were clearly visible in the match report.
To clarify, for Health and Safety reasons, Rovers can only sell the number of tickets that correspond with the seats available in the main stand. Some supporters choose to stand in some areas of the ground and that's why some seats are unoccupied. I'm sure you also have plenty of season ticket holders unable to make every game, so this would help explain it too.
How rare is it in this day and age that a club can put up the 'sold out' signs for a league match? And while the frustration of the supporters who can't get in is totally understandable, as I mentioned on the programme, the second stand on the TV cameras side of the ground should be ready by the time the Hoops play Dundalk on the 22nd of this month.
This is good news as Dundalk would be expected to bring a large travelling support. Sean Prunty was making the point that they made lots of noise at Inchicore last weekend and created a good atmosphere, and it was good to see Bohemians bring such a good away support to Drogheda on what was an awful Friday night weather wise.
I know Johnny Mac raised the question about why there wasn't 10,000 fans at Turner's Cross for the Cork City versus Bray match, but in mitigation, there were doubts about whether the game would go ahead because of events at the High Court, and also because the incessant rain meant the pitch was close to unplayable. In the circumstances, I thought the crowd of over 3,000 wasn't too bad.
After the programme Sean was telling us, that the nickname 'Choons' has stuck with him, and Colm Foley, who must be at least 50 at this stage said that his MNS nickname 'The Kid' has also been taken up by his mates.
Johnny McDonnell didn't mention anything about being a poster-boy for 'Rogaine' as he was called on last week's show.
By the way, am I the only person on the planet who hadn't heard the term '50 pence head' associated to players who mishead a clearance? We had a good example of it in this week's Good Bad and Ugly, when Thomas Heary attempted a headed clearance, and the lads were surprised I'd never heard that phrase.
You learn something new every day I suppose.
