Bolton's former top Premier League referee talks football - every Wednesday

YOU might say that there was no serious damage done by Jay Spearing’s red card against Derby County – but we might not be saying that a little further down the line.

So, okay, he sat out last night's Capital One Cup game against Burton Albion, you might argue Neil Lennon would have been shuffling his squad around anyhow and it didn’t impact on the team that badly.

But in a few months’ time, that red card will still be hanging over the player’s head. If it happened again, then a one-match suspension becomes two, and that’s when trouble starts mounting up.

Looking at the incident, I feel referee Andy Madley has gone looking for trouble.

Now I like Andy, I think he’s a very good referee who managed the League One play-off final superbly back in May, but in this instance I think he needed to give himself a bit more time before jumping to a decision.

There’s four minutes to go, the ball has gone out of play, Bolton aren’t appealing for a penalty and Derby aren’t saying he’s simulated. Where’s the issue? Signal for a goal kick and get on with it.

I’ve said before not every bit of contact is a foul, and every time someone goes to ground it doesn’t mean it is simulation. There are certain factors you have to take into consideration.

Anyone knows that Spearing isn’t a player who goes looking to deceive people and you can tell right away by his reaction that he hasn’t looked to do anything sinister. When you caution some players for simulation you know instantly by the look on their face if you’ve got the decision right and Spearing’s shock – indeed the shock of the Derby goalkeeper and defenders – tells you all you need to know.

I’d be interested to know whether Lennon has asked to see the assessor’s report, which he is quite entitled to do, and find out what he thinks.

I’m sure, if he’d been able to, he would have looked to appeal. But under the Football Association’s current system you can’t appeal a yellow card. I think that should change.

We saw last season in La Liga that a caution for Real Madrid’s Cristiano Ronaldo was rescinded on appeal. Why can’t that happen here?

You don’t want to see every decision pulled back and analysed but for clear and obvious errors, on points of law, a yellow card can still have ramifications further down the line particularly, as in Spearing’s case, when it leads to a red.

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I HATE to say I told you so, but when you throw a referee who isn’t ready into the cauldron of a Premier League game on the opening day of the season you are asking for trouble.

Poor Simon Hooper got launched into the Norwich City v Crystal Palace game despite having never officiated at a top-flight game before.

He hadn’t even been promoted to the Select Group this summer – so why on earth did they give him such a baptism of fire at Carrow Road?

I questioned the decision last Tuesday and got slaughtered on Twitter for it. By Sunday, people were saying I’d got it spot on.

It doesn’t give me any satisfaction to be proved right, but Hooper got three key match decisions wrong, starting with his failure to stamp authority on the game by punishing Glenn Murray for a foul on Graham Dorrans early in the game. A yellow card there would have taken the sting out of the game.

Later he failed to spot a penalty for Norwich when Sebastien Bassong was pushed by Connor Wickham and then disallowed a perfectly good goal by Cameron Jerome – a decision that was later brought up in a phone call from his superiors.

Norwich deserved a referee who was ready; they are not second-class citizens. And equally Hooper deserves to be better equipped before being asked to take on the fastest league in the world. This kind of thing could damage his confidence, and subsequently his career.

Would it not have made more sense to try him out towards the end of last season in a mid-table Premier League game and get an idea whether he could hack it at the top?

The opening day of the season is always a pressure cooker. Everyone wants to make a good start, and that should go for the referees too – they needed their A list out there.

All the while you had an experienced referee like Kevin Friend kicking his heels in the Championship last weekend, while Andre Marriner continues to sit on the naughty step.

This weekend young Paul Tierney takes charge of Watford and West Brom, raising the question: Is he ready?

We have high hopes for Tierney, who has definitely got something about him, but just like Hooper he should have had a run of Championship matches to get his eye in before being lumped into a different class of football.

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CLUBS have been warned of a crackdown on players surrounding referees this season – but I can’t see the punishments doing much good.

Under the new guidelines, any more than two players approaching the official is considered a failure to keep your players under control.

The authorities want to put an end to mad scenes like we had at the Gold Cup semi-final in the summer between Panama and Mexico, where it took 10 minutes to restart the game and clear the chaos.

That’s all well and good but until we start hitting clubs with point deductions rather than piffling fines, which are basically a drop in the ocean at Premier League level, it won’t end the problem.

Sometimes you get a case where players approach you to ask questions – and that is a very different proposition than trying to intimidate you into changing your decision. It’s important that they realise that distinction.

Sometimes an official just needs a moment to think, you might not have seen something clearly and you need to consult your assistant; that’s when you need space to make sure the message is clear.

I’m afraid it looks like another well-meant gesture from the powers that be, which won’t be followed up with enough muscle to make it work.

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ONCE again confusion reigns with the offside rule, and this year we’ve got another interpretation with which to deal.

Leicester City’s fourth goal on Saturday against Sunderland at the King Power Stadium was offside in any country, in any league, on any day of the week.

Marc Albrighton made a challenge on Younes Kaboul in an inactive position but became active when the ball came back into the box and he touched it. Flag should go up, simple.

But as our referee’s assistants continue to get their head round what they are now being told is ‘active’ and ‘inactive’ this will be the first of many such debatable incidents, you can guarantee that.