CONDUCT OF FOOTBALLERS

Gisborne Times, Volume XXVI, Issue 2250, 23 July 1908, Page 1

CONDUCT OF FOOTBALLERS

[To the Editor.] Sir, —I would like to draw tlio attention of the Poverty Bay Rugby Union and footballers generally to the treatment our referees aro subjected to in Thursday matches. Last Thursday we had a referco who lias passed tlio test of the Referees Association, and one who has acted as referee in our representative fixtures. I was a spectator at tlio second match, and I must say that tlio conduct of the spectators (a largo proportion of whom were players) towards tlio referee was disgraceful. Tlio refereo in question forfeited a. half-day’s salary to obligo the players, and I shall be very much surprised, if, after tlio treatment he received, he ever acts in a like capacity for the Thursday players again. I was astonished to hear two well-known players in particular (one of them a this year’s Poverty Bay representative) hooting tlio decisions of the man in ‘charge of the whistle, and I think it is high time the Rugby Union stepped in and dealt severely with such offenders, who in the opinion of many should never be allowed to don the jersey in Poverty Bay again. Trusting the governing body will put a stop to this degrading practico,—l am, etc., “PLAYER,”