“HAVE Y OU E VER PLAYED T HE GAME, REF?!”
Well, yes, if you’re former Wigan, Bury and Leicester midfielder Jason Jarrett, who has his sights set on officiating at the highest level
There’s a good reason why people question the sanity of referees. Anyone who gives up their weekends in order to get dog’s abuse from 22 blokes and their vocal onlookers must be some kind of weirdo, right? Ex-footballers, especially, just don’t do reffing – except Jason Jarrett.
Jarrett, who made more than 300 Football League appearances, called time on his playing career last year after helping the Class of 92’s Salford City win promotion to the seventh tier. But a career with whistle in hand has long been in the pipeline for the 36-year-old – since 2012, in fact. At that time, the midfielder was enjoying a low-key return to football with FC Halifax Town following an 18-month break away from the game battling depression.
“Refereeing was just a bit of an experiment at first,” he tells FFT. “Don’t get me wrong – when I used to play I wasn’t the most polite to the referees – but I just thought: ‘Wait a minute, this is quite a good career. I’m seeing Mark Clattenburg and Howard Webb taking charge of games at Old Trafford. Why can’t I do that?’”
Jarrett is now a Level Four referee, officiating mainly in the ninth-tier North West Counties League, having been promoted in each of his seasons as the man in black. Only ex-huddersfield Town and Chesterfield defender Steve Baines has whistled a similar tune, but that was back in the mid-1990s – refereeing has long since changed.
“I’m not doing it for the money,” Jarrett chuckles. “At the moment it’s about £32 per game plus expenses. The Lancashire FA has helped me out, but I want to take it all the way to the Premier League and now I feel like I’m pretty good at it. I want to get there in the next five or six years – I’ve gone pretty fast already. I’m in it for the long haul. I wouldn’t be doing it otherwise.
“There are no hiding places in the top flight. Some people say that everybody wants to see ex-players reffing in the Premier League, but if you don’t do a good job then everyone will see it.”
If there’s one thing in Jarrett’s favour, it’s a lack of gobby so-and-sos telling him that he hasn’t got a clue.
“I’m probably fitter than most of them!” he laughs. “I get recognised all the time. I know a lot of referees at every level who have had a lot of abuse, so either I am lucky or I have just been doing a good job! I’m yet to come home and think: ‘That was horrible – I don’t want to do this any more.’”
It’s a far cry from Jarrett’s playing days, which were clouded by depression.
“There were probably a good four or five years when I was at my best and it completely ruined it,” he says. “I’m just really enthusiastic about the future now.
“When you’re a footballer, it becomes your obsession. When I look back at it now, I appreciate that I was able to be one – I should be proud of myself. But there’s so much more to achieve in my career now. That was Chapter One, and now we’re on to Chapter Two.
“I don’t just want to be a Premier League referee – I want to become the best referee in the country.”
Howard Webb, it’s probably best if you stay in the comfy confines of your BT truck. This man means business.