At first, everything looks like an everyday scene of youth football: The referee has just blown the final whistle for the district cup final of the C-Juniors between FC Germania 1911 Enkheim and FC Kalbach, the Enkheimers celebrate their 2-0 victory with spectators of the same age on the pitch.

But in addition to the youngsters, a father also storms onto the pitch, yells at the 15-year-old referee and threatens to behead him. The referee backs away, his 16-year-old assistant referee rushes to his aid and sends his father off the pitch. After that, the referees retire to the dressing room.

The incident occurred the weekend before last – and has now become a major topic in (social) media because the Frankfurt Referees' Association has published a video on the Instagram platform. She also describes that the father had already insulted the referees throughout the game. The man is now being investigated for insult and threat, police said.

Especially at the end of the season, when decisive games are pending, the incidents would become more frequent, according to the Frankfurt Referees' Association. For years, there has also been an increase in attacks on referees. In the youth sector, 95 percent of the perpetrators are legal guardians. "Many clubs don't take on enough responsibility to put parents in their place," complains Florian Möller, public relations officer of the Frankfurt Referees' Association.

One reason for the problem of young talent

Attacks like this are not an isolated case, but sad everyday life for amateur referees. The referees' association reports on various cases in the recent past: A week before the attack in Kalbach, a C-class player in Frankfurt had hit a referee twice in the face. Last weekend, on the other hand, a game in the Kreisliga B Darmstadt had to be abandoned when a spectator knocked down a player. The linesman from the video had also been attacked by supposed fans who followed him to the subway after a game.

As a consequence of such incidents, the Referees' Association now recommends its members to only play games where stewards are on site. Although these are prescribed by the Hessian Football Association according to the statutes, the clubs are often very lax in their implementation or simply cannot find people for this. As a result, even young referees are often at the mercy of attacks on and off the pitch, as many amateur games have to be refereed alone.

Möller now expects the responsible committees at the Hessian Football Association to provide firm guidelines on how to deal with insults by spectators in the future. After all, attacks like this are also a reason for the problem of young talent in refereeing. At least the young referees from the video were not intimidated: they were back on the pitch last weekend.