Hibs boss Lee Johnson calls for former players to be 'fast-tracked' into refereeing

Hibs manager Lee Johnson believes former players should be fast-tracked into becoming match officials.

The Easter Road boss was speaking about the introduction of Video Assistant Referees (VAR) ahead of his club’s Friday night cinch Premiership meeting with St Johnstone. It is the first Scottish top-flight meeting to be played with the technology, and Hearts’ home clash with Celtic the following day will be the first televised game to be played with VAR. Giving his thoughts on the standard of refereeing in Scotland, Johnson insisted there was a ‘lot of room for improvement’ and voiced his opinion that recently-retired players who aren’t pursuing a coaching career should be given support to make it to the top of the refereeing ladder.

“I’d like to see ex-players fast-tracked in refereeing. I know there will always be a risk with bias but, especially with VAR in now, over the next five to ten years it would be good to see former players, who understand the various levels of contact and what is and what isn’t a foul,” he said.

“I’d like to see it. It’s not really happened anywhere but it’s been spoken about a lot. In Scotland, if they opened it up to the potential of ex-players, I think it would be a good way for an ex-player and the right type of character to step into."

Johnson didn’t name names, unsurprisingly, but confirmed that there were individuals in the current Hibs squad who he believes have what it takes to enter the refereeing world post-football. He pointed out that not every player wants to, or can, follow the coaching route.

“Yes, I think so. If you look at someone who has had a good career but maybe hasn’t maybe earned loads of money, they can’t afford to either play on or work on but they want to work in football. They may not be planning coaching or sometimes players get injured halfway through their career

"I just think it would be a good study: let’s take five players with two or three years’ training, do the process, and work their way up through the juniors and into the SPFL and see. I’ll bet there would be three or four volunteers who have just finished who would be more than happy to do that.”