to be fair, this is England, so there are like 73 football clubs between City and his birthplace

Don’t worry guys, I’m sure the FA, the Premier League, UEFA and FIFA, bastions of sporting integrity, will come together to tackle the corruption of the likes of Chelsea and City any day now.

It’s a mark of profound respect for an opponent who has performed well. Just good lads being good lads, football was the winner on the day.

The idea that higher wages prevents corruption is false. Only checks and balances will do that, and football has very few.

I can and I will. You’re talking about risks and repercussions in work, there are many, many jobs where the risks are far worse than what a referee risks. Police, who get paid less, how much do they risk? There are mundane jobs where people don’t get paid much but the regulatory and compliance environment means they risk jail time if they mess up. Builders, plumbers, electricians, mechanics, all of these jobs, if they do something wrong they risk financially and legally. If you don’t fit a seatbelt or a tire or a break pad right as a mechanic and that ends up killing someone in an accident, you risk literal fucking jail time. So again, give me 120k to jog around for 180 odd minutes every week with a bunch of overpaid wankers and I’ll take it every day.

You wanted to talk about salaries and what the job is and now you don’t because you realised your argument was a bit dumb, but no, I’m sorry, they get paid plenty and looking at their performances I’d say they deserve less.

Yes, 100%. This is what a lot of doctors/surgeons get paid and they have to do like a decade of study and have people’s lives in their hands, so yes. To jog around a bit, blow a whistle, and have the best view of football of literally any non-player, yes, 120k sounds like theft.

I’m sorry but 120k a year to referee a couple of matches each week is a lot of money. 60k base is huge, for essentially doing nothing. It’s not like they’re athletes, some of them are outright out of shape, like, what the fuck do they do with their time? A couple of meetings to discuss refereeing shit? They’re essentially doing a relatively normal work out plan (the kind of thing plenty of people do as a hobby) and then running around for 90 minutes, and they’re collecting a massive salary for it, and then most of them still manage to do a terrible job.

They’re basically robbing the league blind at this point.