Annual licence of the system
All licensed leagues have equal access to all the capabilities that RefPal offers, but can choose which way they set up their unique system. When starting with RefPal the first step is to set up the new league.
First time set-up of the system includes:
- Set-up of the league, the teams, players, referees and administrators
- Set-up of the user rights & access rights
- Launch seminars for the league administrators (4 h), referees (2 h) & observers (2 h)
- Progress seminar for the FA/referees at mid-season (4-6 h) to analyze the developments, feedback, possible issues and the way forward
- * Translation of the system into the desired language (separate fee)
Game & marking module
All league games are thoroughly analyzed, edited and cut into ~15-minute refereeing highlights videos. Separate situations are chosen and incidents are created which become open for evaluation to the refereeing community and committee.
The marking is done using different scales for different topics and subtopics that vary in value from 1-12, 2-8 and +/-. Each number has a specific meaning attached to it. This creates comparison options for learning and evaluating purposes.
Match referees can evaluate and comment their in-game decisions. Referee committee sees their comments and marks as well as the community mark, and can easily evaluate situations and compare opinions within the committee before giving out the official marks. All of them can tag similar incidents from the database referring to previous evaluations to form more unity in decision making and in the evaluation process.
As numbers speak a universal language, are more objective, and create comparison then such a system forms one of the main frameworks that RefPal uses and is built upon. Data revolution has sparked big changes in football over the last decades, but has not really yet reached the refereeing community. RefPal brings change and revolutionizes the way we think about refereeing analysis and education.
Incidents module
All incidents can be filtered using the actual game decision, committee mark, community mark, specific referee mark. This data creates a platform to study both practical and theoretical know-how personally and within the whole refereeing community. Doing so brings out the problem areas and creates a detailed learning opportunity as never before.
The module can be used for sorting and filtering situations in the regard to using them in the E-learning center. Choosing clips and adding them with-in a click to VAR training, tests, seminars and to the “best practice library”.
Statistics & rankings module
The scales and marking framework produce a data pool that automatically turns live decisions and theoretical answers into key performance indicators. The other part of statistics is the theoretical know-how which comes from marking and evaluating incidents.
The way incidents are divided into topics (~20) and subtopics (>200) creates detailed statistics about referee performance and development, both personally and of the whole league. All data can be opened and viewed as clips. The statistics module allows a lot of possibilities in making conclusions and planning steps to further improve refereeing accuracy.
Referees are also driven by the “RefPal ranking” which involves a “Weekly Top5 feature” and the “Seasonal rankings”. Referees enhance themselves in theoretical learning to be better and better in the rankings. They can also see how they are doing by which topics and subtopics compared to their colleagues and their own previous seasons.
Team & player scouting module
As the incidents created involve offending players & teams then this opens up a scouting module. It allows referees to prepare for upcoming match as they can watch the previous encounters of the teams and compare the teams & players via topics and subtopics. As the saying goes – if you fail to prepare then prepare to fail.
E-learning center (Best Practice Library, VAR, Tests, Seminars, LOTG)
The module will be designed to allow deeper and more concentrated theoretical learning. This gives the committee and the system administrators a chance to use all the clips in the system to create any learning concept of their wish.
The “Best Practice Library” is a tool which allows teaching in any chosen subtopic. Choosing clips from the same subtopic and aligning them on a scale from 1-12 teaches referees to understand the difference between situations of the same kind, but different outcome.
The VAR module is meant for learning purposes and also for testing the referee’s knowledge of the VAR intervention protocol. The test and seminar module allow the committee to create live or online tests/seminars. The LOTG questions test allows testing the referee’s knowledge of the Laws of the Game.
Extra leagues
FIFA referees have a chance to create their own private “league” where they can upload and administer their international matches. This allows them and their teams to analyze their performances. It also allows them to share their clips with local and international mentors to get further feedback.
Video analysis & administration
Refereeing highlights
- Full match analyzed and edited into a ~15-minute video
- Highlights include all whistled fouls, possible fouls, important play-on decisions, yellow and red card incidents, game management and laws of the game incidents, offsides, positioning and many other
- Incidents are provided with extra replays, slow-motion, zooms and still-frames. We create similarly built-up clips of incident topics and scenarios to highlight the main learning importance (this varies in severity of offences, stopping an attack, penalty, offside, positioning)
- Administrator users have the right to ask for certain missing incidents to be added to the refereeing video. If available then also to add angles from offline-cameras of the game (upon special request)
Administration
- All necessary game data added and game opened for evaluation
- Incidents created based upon the most important learning points of the game (on average ~15 incidents per game) and brought out as separate evaluation clips tagged with all relevant clip data
- Updates on the league, teams, players and users
Expert Opinion
- An international RefPal expert works through each round of games first watching the refereeing highlights video and then giving his marks and comments on each incident so they can be used by the FA as a subjective outside view before finalizing their own evaluation and comments
- The evaluations will be available 72h after the refereeing highlights video is uploaded
- Experts are either current or former UEFA referees or observers with significant international experience, with at least 2 years of experience in evaluating incidents in RefPal and have high competence in following the latest UEFA / IFAB guidelines