SC Soccer Forums SCSoccer.com Forums Club Soccer & ODP Where were the officials?

Are the officials in the lower state on strike? No officials showed up to referee the challenge league games this morning at either Mt. Pleasant or Summerville. As a result many of these games had to be postponed. This is real inconvenience for those who travelled a couple of hours to get to their games. The League needs to provide some explanation for this.

That is unbelievable. Was it true for all games? There were about a dozen games, if PMSL is included. U17B and U16G (SCSCL); U13G and U12G (PMSL), from what I saw on hotstat. All except one game were at Summerville. Not only inconvenient but also expensive, especially with today's gas prices.

You won't get much of an explanation from Steve Cothran except that "that's the way it is". The SCSCL/PMSL organization is awfu! They in no way take into consideration parents/players sacrifices. To them, club soccer is the end-all of all life. Forget SAT/ACT tests, Carolina/Clemson football games, visiting colleges on the weekend for possible admission. Games should be played on Sunday and we should return to regional play (Coastal/Mid-State/Upper State, etc.) and have tournaments for the experience of playing other teams from different areas. As of now, the local tournaments have been rendered obsolete, because you play the same teams from your "statewide" league play anyway. Club soccer in our state steadily sux and I think that until we have alternatives to Cothran & Co. it will continue to be an unpleasant overall experience!

I have no explanation why there weren't any refs in the lower part of the state, but I don't think the organization SCSCL is as bad as you make it out to be. This state really doesn't have enough teams to go back to a regional style of play (Upstate, Midstate and LowState), especially at the older age groups. We're actually fortunate that Columbia lies in the middle of the state and is almost exactly between Greenville, Charleston, and Rock Hill (where most of the non-columbia teams are). I prefer local games, but an hour and a half drivwe to Columbia isn't that bad two or three times a season. When you look at all the teams that are in the state (boys and girls) and all the games that need to be scheduled and changed, I think that they do an adeqwuate job. Unfortunately yes, sometimes games and refs do get screwed up, but in my experience it happens very infreqently. I do agree and believe that games should be played on Sunday, but in our case some were. With regards to tournaments, you do have somewhat of a point. Since the state teams already play each other, the goal is to get competition from outside the state, and that is sometimes hard to do. I believe that is one of the reasons for the cancellation of the Charleston Turkey Shootout.