Female footballers are on the warpath: they want men to referee them too.

BarcelonaReal Madrid's first victory against Barça was marred by a refereeing decision: Basque referee Olatz Rivera Olmedo ruled out Jana Fernández's goal for a non-existent offside. The controversy hit the women's refereeing system hard, tarnished and the target of several controversies after the blatant error that determined the scoreline: the score was disallowed from 2-1 for Barça with ten minutes left to play, but the score fell to 1-2 in favor of Real Madrid, who eventually won 3-1.

Following Sunday's derby at Montjuïc, Beatriz Álvarez, president of the Liga F, has cried foul and demanded structural changes. The leader believes the level of the referees is not up to the competition's standards and is unwilling to let more time pass without changes. "The RFEF promoted female refereeing a few years ago, but it's a mistake to promote it at the elite level. It has to be done from the grassroots [...], not by promoting referees who shouldn't be in a professional league. We must have value as a League, and the fact of having referees at the level of the Third RFEF does not Sport.

This week, a meeting will be held between representatives of the league and the Technical Committee of Referees (CTA) to discuss measures that can be taken to solve the existing problems. The possibility of having male referees also officiate league matches or the introduction of VAR will be on the table. In fact, some players, such as Barça's Cata Coll, questioned the current quota system in a recent interview: "We should be refereed by the best, regardless of whether they are boys or girls." "There are some very good girls, but why can't boys referee us?" she added.

The referees are self-critical and ask for understanding.

According to refereeing sources consulted by this newspaper, a large part of the refereeing team is aware that there are inappropriate errors in a category like the F League, the highest level of women's national football, and they understand the teams' frustration. They know that clubs have become more professional in all areas, and the demands are passed on to coaches, players, and also referees.

This understanding does not prevent them from feeling underserved by the players. The evolution of women's football is unstoppable, and they have been working on its promotion for many years. In contrast, women's refereeing is much more recent and only became professional at the start of the 2022-23 season. They believe that they too deserve the opportunity to follow the same path and that their performance will gradually improve.

That said, they are completely opposed to the possibility of male referees officiating in the F League. For female referees, it would be a monumental step backwards that would deprive them of the necessary experience to continue progressing.

All female referees in the F League train exactly the same as those in the men's First Division. They attend seminars to analyze plays and unify criteria, they attend training camps to improve their performance, they follow strict physical preparation monitored by the CTA (Certification of Training and Technical Training), and all the matches they officiate are evaluated by an informant. However, as far as salaries are concerned, there is no parity. While a male referee in the men's First Division can pocket around €300,000 gross per year, female referees in the F League earn around €25,000 per year.

The F League, without VAR due to the fields where it is played

The implementation of video refereeing in the women's league is on the table and has the support of both the teams and the referees themselves. It would provide a safety net that would eliminate the most glaring errors and reduce controversy. Despite the willingness of all parties, the football fields where the F League is played make the installation of elite VAR impossible due to the lack of infrastructure to accommodate all the necessary cameras.

The alternative is a much cheaper VAR that operates in a completely different way than usual and is defined as a "video review." It consists of a monitor installed at the foot of the pitch, and the team's own coaches can request a review of a play. They have limited requests, but as long as the referee corrects the on-field decision, the team retains the number of review possibilities. In this system, there is no VAR room, and the images that the referee analyzes on the monitor are supplied by a coach, who relies on television replays.