Panaji: The All India Football Federation (AIFF) will call for a review meeting between Indian Super League (ISL), clubs and its refereeing department after FC Goa formally protested that the standard of officiating has been “poor from the opening weeks of the season.”Goa were left fuming after their 1-2 loss against Bengaluru FC at home on Friday. The winner in stoppage time came from a throw-in that should have been Goa’s but was taken by the visitors.From the throw-in, Bengaluru scored the winner.“Some people are just terrible at both refereeing and politics,” Goa’s director of football Lokesh Bherwani said in a post on X, a clear dig at referee Pratik Mondal who contested and lost state assembly elections in West Bengal earlier this year.Club captain Sandesh Jhingan was pleading with the referee to consult his assistants after Soham Varshneya struck with a powerful left-footer from close range. Even after the final whistle, the defender tried to convince the referee that the throw-in should have never been taken by Bengaluru.“This is such a basic mistake,” Jhingan told the broadcaster in a post-match interaction. “I love the referees and I know it’s a tough job, but how many times? If it’s a very marginal decision, I’ll put my hand up and I’ll say, it’s OK. But such big errors? The (assistant) referee does not have the courage to take a decision, he keeps his flag down, and then we are defending our box.”Club CEO Ravi Puskur formally wrote to the AIFF to strongly protest the performance of the match officials, which included referee Pratik Mondal, assistant referees Dipesh Manohar Sawant and Asraful Alam, and fourth official Jamal Mohammad.“The officials in this match failed at the most basic task in football: awarding a throw-in to the correct team. That is a schoolboy error. It is a pure and simple loss of concentration, and it is the kind of mistake that should never occur at the top level of the game in this country,” Puskur wrote in his email to AIFF deputy secretary general M Satyanarayan on Saturday.Two of the officials were also involved in the Churchill Bros versus NorthEast United encounter, played 24 hours earlier at the same venue.At a time when Indian football is fighting for credibility – with fans, broadcasters, sponsors and investors – every refereeing incident like the one at Fatorda, Puskur pointed out, “feeds the narrative that our football is not professional, not well run and not worth backing.”“We cannot call this a new dawn for Indian football while the most basic decisions on the pitch are being got wrong, and while there is no transparent accountability or feedback from the referees’ department. Without it, the game is being held back,” said Puskur.Goa have urged the AIFF to take concrete, visible measures towards reform, and specifically requested a formal review of the officiating in Friday’s clash, with written findings shared with the club.“If the PGMOL is the benchmark this (refereeing) department aspires to, then we urge you to look at what the PGMOL actually does when its officials get decisions wrong: it acknowledges errors publicly, explains decisions, reviews performance transparently and communicates with clubs. We should expect nothing less,” said Puskur.PGMOL or the Professional Game Match Officials Limited, is the body responsible for overseeing match officials, including referees and their assistants, in English professional football.
