Former National players and now Head Coaches of Colombo FC and SLTB SC Mohamed Roomy and Pala Wijesekara were dissatisfied with the refereeing in their 2016/17 FA Cup Round of 64 encounter at the Kelaniya Football Complex.

Against a tricky yet formidable opponent, the 2016 Dialog Champions League winners Colombo FC eked past SLTB with two 2nd half goals from new man Dilan Kaushalya and Danushka Madushanka.

However according to the Coaches it was the refereeing decisions on the day that took center stage.

“A lot of decisions were wrong today. When I take a decision if I am not sure I can quickly talk with the side referee (assistant referee) and correct it. He doesn’t have to wait for the help to come. They take from 4th referee,” Pala Wijesekara added.

He was referring to a throw-in call in the 1st half which the referee was unsure about and ended up awarding to the wrong team at which time the 4th referee had to intervene after sometime to reverse the call.

“A lot of red and yellow cards are received when the referee doesn’t blow the whistle at the right time. They don’t take action and warn the player early on and the players continue to do the same foul over and over again. Decisions come in late and the players also get frustrated,” he went on to say.

Throughout the match, the consistency of the decisions were questioned which ultimately did not bode well with the two sides.
“It was horrible refereeing. This is not the first time. I have seen (it happen) so many times this same referee,” Roomy shared the same sentiments.

“I am not criticizing the referee in a bad way because I was also a referee. What I am saying is if this continues the future of Sri Lankan refereeing is questionable. We only talk about Dilan (Dilan Perera) and Robesh (Nivon Robesh) and cannot depend on them because they are just two referees.

We have so many tournaments and matches. We need so many referees. We need good workshops and guidance for the referees. We need good upcoming referees for these matches,” Roomy cast a dark cloud over the future of referees in Sri Lanka.