SOM Talks Referees | Ep#2 Tara Jones

Former Super League referee and mental health ambassador Ian Smith has given an impassioned plea to end the abuse of match officials, which he believes is prompting many to seek alternative careers.    In the final episode of an exclusive podcast series from the mental fitness charity State of Mind Sport, Smith opens up on the highs and lows of a remarkable career that saw him turn his back on refereeing to work promoting positive mental health.   He is now back involved in rugby league as a coaching consultant for Super League match officials and despite describing refereeing as the best thing he has ever done, is under no illusions where most of the difficulties in the profession arise.   “For some bizarre reason people feel that as soon as you put that referees' uniform on you are fair game and should accept abuse,” Smith tells host George Riley.   “Never accept abuse of any kind regardless of what uniform you wear. If it was so easy then everybody would do it. If it was such an easy job why are we struggling to recruit referees? We are struggling to recruit because of the negativity and abuse.  "That is probably eighty to eight five per cent of the reason that people don’t take up the whistle. It may even be more. There are so many ex-players who come out of the game and we try to get them into the refereeing pathway – no chance. Why would I want to? Why would I want to put myself in that arena? And they don’t.   “Behind the uniform there is a real person that laughs, cries, bleeds and screams. So where is it in our psyche of rugby league fans, which is a fantastic sport with fantastic people – where is it in their psyche that they feel that is acceptable? In no other walk of life is that acceptable.”    Smith now speaks passionately about his own mental health journey both during and after his time refereeing, as a presenter with State of Mind Sport. In this latest podcast he combines some glorious highs from his refereeing journey, with some bitter lows in an unmissable conversation.   “For the vast majority of my career social media wasn’t around so it didn’t impact me. The name-calling was to your face at the ground. I don’t know how I would have coped now if I had got some of the abuse the young lads get now.    “I sent off Lee Radford for punching Ryan Bailey, and it turned out to be my last ever big decision. It was just as I was coming off the pitch I looked up and there was quite a bit of tea and coffee aimed at me. I looked up and saw the hatred and sat in the changing room. Players were passing and banging on my door - fans and dignitaries effing and blinding. I sat in that moment, a perfect storm, everything seemed to come in and for the first time in my life, and the one and only time in my life I thought I don’t want to do this anymore.    “A horrendous decision, but you only need to be in that moment for that one time to make the wrong choice. Sometimes what doesn’t kill you makes you stronger.    “Being a rugby league referee was one of the best things – the best thing I have ever done professionally. I loved it, absolutely loved it. Warts and all, abuse and all. It just took that moment for me to decide it wasn’t enough.”   SOM Talks: Referees is the latest series from award-winning mental health and fitness charity State of Mind Sport. Hosted by George Riley, each episode explores themes in line with the unique challenges faced by our match officials both on and off the field.   Our previous series – SOM Talks: Transitions, featured six powerful tales of mental health challenges associated with major life and career changes and remains available to listen to.   SOM Talks is available on all major podcast platforms. You can also watch on YouTube: https://youtu.be/IJpzHhlywnw

Rugby league’s Head of Match Officials has revealed how referees are affected by “poor form” as much as players and has promised greater transparency in decision-making in a bid to tackle the mounting problem of abuse of refs both at games and on social media.   In the latest episode of an exclusive podcast series from the mental fitness charity State of Mind Sport, Bentham reveals his own lowest moments as a referee and highlights how damaging social media abuse can be to his team of match officials.   “There is a person behind the Ronseal shirt, a bloke there or a girl there that is trying their best to make the decisions,” Bentham tells host George Riley.   “The only reason they are involved in refereeing is because they love the sport in the first place. You are not born a referee. We need to improve that (online abuse) and one of the ways we can do it is to make sure people understand the way that we interpret the laws and how our policy works, and that is something we are going to do pre-season."   Bentham is back in rugby league after a spell working as a VAR coach in Premier League football – helping football referees and video referees better communicate their decisions. It is an experience that he feels can help him fight back against the abuse directed at referees across all sports. Two of his elite referees – Chris Kendall and Liam Moore – have already appeared on the SOM Talks podcast sharing their own experiences of abuse.    “If I watch football I have opinions on decisions made by the referees. What I don’t do is go on social media and talk about them and I certainly don’t go on and abuse people because they have made a certain decision,” says Bentham.   “A fan came to me at the weekend and said ‘It’s no wonder your referees get abuse with the state of some of your decisions’.   “Chris made a really good point that he has a right as a human being to be on social media. That is the way the generation speaks to each other. He has a right to be on there without being abused. He doesn’t have to give in to the keyboard warriors which is 100% right. Personally I wouldn’t be on there but they have every right to be on there and they have every right to be protected by us.”   Bentham reveals in great detail the level of scrutiny each referee is subjected to in their weekly reviews, as well as the mental impact of both online abuse and poor performance.   “Sometimes you can just hit a really difficult run where the calls are so difficult and that knocks your confidence a bit.    “You watch a referee and he is looking all the time at the side to the touch judge for assistance on a call he should be making himself. Another one would be somebody needlessly going to the video ref time every time because they don’t have that level of confidence just to point and give the try.    “The worst ones are where you give them trying to be Mr Confident and then you walk back for the conversion and look up (at the screen) and the guy has dropped it and you’ve given the try. You are thinking I was trying to be confident and just give it and that is the one I should have sent up. It’s almost like I can’t catch a break here.”   SOM Talks: Referees is the brand new series from award-winning mental health and fitness charity State of Mind Sport. Hosted by George Riley, each episode explores themes in line with the unique challenges faced by our match officials both on and off the field.   Our previous series – SOM Talks: Transitions, featured six powerful tales of mental health challenges associated with major life and career changes and remains available to listen to.   SOM Talks is available on all major podcast platforms.

RFL director and former elite referee Rob Hicks admits that rugby league may be attracting “the most resilient people” rather than “the best quality referees” because of the amount of personal abuse that comes with the job.   In the fourth episode of an exclusive podcast series from the mental fitness charity State of Mind Sport, Hicks reveals the scale of abuse suffered by both himself and his colleagues as well as his belief of how damaging it has been to the recruitment and retention of top match officials.    Hicks is now the Rugby Football League’s Director of Operations and Legal, having taken charge of two Challenge Cup Finals, two Grand Finals and two World Club Challenges as well as numerous internationals during his career as an elite match official.   And opening up on the SOM Talks: Referees podcast, Hicks describes his horror at seeing recent abuse of referees from young children, outlines the difficulties in keeping hold of referees as abuse escalates, and opens up on his own learnings from a career at the very top of the profession.   “The reality is that we lose a lot more referees than we recruit because they get fed up of the abuse,” Hicks tells host George Riley.   “They turn up for their first game at under-12s and people think that they should be Chris Kendall in the middle of that field. Until we get to a stage specifically at junior and community rugby league where people accept that referees at that level are learning as well, we will always struggle.    “It is not easy being a referee anyway, then adding that real horrid nature of personal abuse, threats, social media, why would people do it? Perhaps all you ever do is get the most resilient people rising to the top rather than the best quality referees. Abuse is the biggest factor for holding back recruitment and retention.”   Hicks also discusses how social media has transformed the volume of abuse directed at referees in all sports and has urged those in power to do more to stop it. It is a theme detailed emotionally by top ref Chris Kendall in episode 3 of SOM Talks: Referees.   “Abuse used to happen in the stands and there would be the odd chant and criticism around but it would end in 80 minutes. Now it seems to go on forever and Chris articulated that really well in his episode with you. I have witnessed first-hand some of the messages he has had, that Marcus (Griffiths) has had, that I have had, or others have had.    “It is difficult when it gets personal, some of the things that have been said are downright wrong and abhorrent. To hear Chris talk about a picture of his newborn son and somebody in their right mind thinking they would wish death of an infant for being the son of a referee I think is beyond words if I’m honest. Social media needs to have a look at itself as companies to decide what is and isn’t acceptable. The online harms bill that is going through parliament does some of that but it needs to go a lot further."   SOM Talks: Referees is the brand new series from award-winning mental health and fitness charity State of Mind Sport. Hosted by George Riley, each episode explores themes in line with the unique challenges faced by our match officials both on and off the field.    Our previous series – SOM Talks: Transitions, featured six powerful tales of mental health challenges associated with major life and career changes and remains available to listen to.   SOM Talks is available on all major podcast platforms.  

One of rugby league’s top match officials Chris Kendall believes sport has an unhealthy obsession with referees that is negatively impacting refs, recruitment and the game as a whole.    In the third episode of an exclusive podcast series from the mental fitness charity State of Mind Sport, Kendall opens up on how he copes with the social media abuse directed his way as one of the most maligned referees in the British game. He discusses the controversy of the 2024 Challenge Cup Final in which he sin-binned two players in the opening minutes of the game in front of 65,000 fans at Wembley, and describes how a strong family unit is the backbone to his success in an unforgiving career.   The 32-year old is one of the most recognisable referees in rugby league, regularly being trusted to oversee Grand Finals, Challenge Cup Finals and internationals, having once been a promising player himself in the Huddersfield academy.    Kendall seems to attract criticism wherever he goes - regardless of how well he performs, and reveals how a public perception of him is at complete odds with his true character.   “There is a popular misconception that referees like to be the showpiece event and make it all about them," he says.  "I might cop that a little bit more than others. 'The Chris Kendall Show'. That couldn’t be any further from the truth.

The SOM Talks Podcast is BACK! This series focusses on the lives of our Rugby League referees. In episode two, our host George Riley speaks to Tara Jones who recently made history as the first woman to referee a senior domestic professional Rugby League fixture in the Northern Hemisphere.

Leading Super League referee Liam Moore has opened up on the mental strength required to perform at the elite level, disclosing his own toughest moments and the methods he and the RFL match officials use to deal with abuse.   In the first episode of an exclusive new podcast series from the mental fitness charity State of Mind Sport, the World Club Challenge referee discusses the reality of life in the spotlight for one of sport’s most maligned professions, and reveals how the team of match officials support each other on and off the pitch.   Moore tells host George Riley how finding refereeing gave him a purpose, and explains how he is able to thrive in a profession that comes with incessant abuse both in person and online.    “You have got to be pretty mentally strong to shut noise out,” says Moore.   “It is very rare that people are going to actually congratulate referees, praise referees. I don’t go looking for that.  I just try to keep away from the noise. The people who review the games in the match officials department – it is their opinion that really matters. You just have to park the noise and that comes with experience and being round the block a bit – understanding how to switch off and go again.   “Being a referee, one thing you are guaranteed to face is adversity. There is a lot of adversity along the way, a lot of disappointments, a lot of errors you will make, difficult conversations and difficult moments. If you can prepare yourself in such a way that you are stable with your home life, you have your people around you that give you unconditional support.    “There are nine of us now within the full-time group and all of us will go through difficult moments, sometimes through no fault of ours, we will be headline news or people will be talking about us. Sharing those experiences and - with some of the younger guys  - passing that experience on and being a listening ear. 'I have been through this, I’m possibly going to go through it again, this is how I dealt with it, if you need to talk to somebody talk to me'. You have got to have people around you that you can trust, that is really important for referees because we are on the frontline of it."   In a frank and wide-ranging interview in the first episode of the new SOM Talks series, Moore also reveals the role that refereeing has played in managing his own physical health and urges anyone hurling abuse at officials to stop and think about what they are doing.    “I think most fair-minded people see being a referee as a difficult job. I would just ask that people  - if they ever confront themselves with criticism of referees - just try to put yourself in the shoes of the referee, whether that is in the middle of a difficult decision where you have 26 people in fighting, put yourself in that moment and ask yourself if you could do that job. And if the answer is no then maybe give the referee a little bit more breathing room and a bit more understanding.    “When I started refereeing I was at school and carrying a lot of weight,” Moore reveals.   “I was 15 stone when I first started refereeing when I was just ready to leave school. I lost a lot of weight refereeing in a couple of years, over two stone. I knew that the weight I was at I was never going to get any higher than community level. I knew I needed to get fitter to develop as an official, that was one of the motivations to get fit and lose weight.   “A couple of years later fitness was one of my biggest strengths, so I turned a weakness into a real positive. Unless you are fit enough to keep up with players at a certain level you have a glass ceiling, Fitness isn’t everything but it is key to progressing as an official."   SOM Talks: Referees is the brand new series from the award-winning mental health and fitness charity State of Mind Sport. Hosted by George Riley, each episode explores themes in line with the unique challenges faced by our match officials both on and off the field. 

Rugby superstar Sam Tomkins has revealed how he’s dealt with a career of online abuse and detailed the plans he has put in place for his retirement from professional sport. The England international, who won three Grand Finals and two Challenge Cup trophies with Wigan, opens up to host George Riley in the official SOM Talks podcast from leading mental fitness charity State of Mind Sport. Tomkins, 32, reveals he will end his playing days in France, where he is currently starring for Super League leaders Catalans Dragons, and admits he has learned lessons from players who have failed to plan for their futures, including Great Britain ace Leon Pryce. “I would like to retire here in France,” he says. “We are really settled. My two boys are in school, my daughter starts next year and I have another baby boy due this week. My kids are fully engrossed in French life and don’t remember England." “I know my seasons are limited and I am ready for it whenever it may come. I have seen a lot of people retire and not be ready for it financially, and I listened to your podcast with Leon who didn’t really have his back-up plans." “I’ve had to have a real think about what I want to do. I’m lucky financially that I have invested in properties which has put me in a decent position.“ In an honest and wide-ranging discussion, Tomkins also reveals how he has dealt with a career of online abuse, but admits seeing his family hurt by it has been upsetting. “I just think that if someone I don’t know can make a judgement on me as a person from watching me for an hour and a half playing a game. That’s a really strange way of judging someone’s character as a person." “I’ve had the worst possible things said to me online but I know they’d never say that in the street." “People wish really bad injuries on me and my mum has struggled with that badly. And that’s bothered me.“ “The only thing that has bothered me is when things have been said around my parents. But I say to my mum it’s not real life. You don’t watch Coronation Street and start kicking off with the actors when you see them in the road!” ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ SOM Talks is the official podcast from award-winning mental health and fitness charity State of Mind Sport. Hosted by George Riley, each episode explores themes in line with the unprecedented and unique challenges that we are individually and collectively facing right now. The inaugural series explores Transitions – the mental health challenges associated with major life and career changes. SOM Talks is available on all major podcast platforms.

Rugby great Leon Pryce has revealed he suffered a loss of identity when his career ended and won’t allow his son to make the same “stupid mistakes” as he embarks on his own professional career. Pryce, a former Great Britain international, won every domestic club honour in a glittering career with Bradford, St Helens, Hull FC and Catalan Dragons, but struggled to find his next path after retirement. Opening up to host George Riley on the official SOM Talks podcast from leading mental fitness charity State of Mind Sport, Pryce reveals how hard he has had to work to get his life back on track. “You assume that because you have got a profile in the game, you’re always going to be able to pick up work around the game. That’s my own fault, I have nobody else to blame. “You think you’re this superstar, people want to ring you up and be your friend and you kind of assume and think it can’t be that hard surely. It was such a wrong attitude to have and I will never make that mistake again, I will never allow William to make that mistake. It’s something I’m already working on with him now, so that he won’t be in the same position that I put myself in.” 18-year-old Will Pryce is just beginning his journey, and scored a try on his full Super League debut for Huddersfield against Wigan. Leon says Will has a wise head on his shoulders and has learned lessons from seeing firsthand his dad’s struggles. “I went from training in and around 30 lads every day for 20 years, to being sat on my own in the house watching Jeremy Kyle. That sent me into a dark hole. “I was drinking too much. Where I’d go and play rugby I’d instead pick up a bottle of wine and go home and feel sorry for myself. “Playing rugby gave me an escape and massive coping mechanisms, and when you cut that out I didn’t really know where to turn.” Pryce accepted help from Sporting Chance and set about getting his life back on track. “It’s been a long journey to get to where I am at the moment. It’s an inside job and I’ve had to really work at it. “Even though I’m in a really good place now and enjoy my job, I still have a massive void that probably won’t ever be filled, through not being involved in rugby. It is a game where people can drop out very easily. There isn’t much work about. It’s not like football where there’s a million jobs.” SOM Talks is the official podcast from award-winning mental health and fitness charity State of Mind Sport. Hosted by George Riley, each episode explores themes in line with the unprecedented and unique challenges that we are individually and collectively facing right now. The inaugural series explores Transitions  - the mental health challenges associated with major life and career changes. SOM Talks is available on all major podcast platforms

Former Leeds captain Stevie Ward has revealed the emotional moment he told close friend Rob Burrow that he was having to retire from professional sport. Ward walked away from rugby league earlier this year aged just 27 as he struggled with neurological issues connected to concussion. Six months after announcing his retirement, the two-time Grand Final winner continues to suffer with migraines, nausea and dizziness related to concussions he suffered in his final year as a player. Rob Burrow was diagnosed with Motor Neurone Disease in 2019 and Ward says his inspirational friend’s journey has had a major impact on his own life.  Speaking to host George Riley on the official SOM Talks podcast from award-winning mental fitness charity State of Mind Sport, Ward opened up about his own very difficult period of transition, which began when he told Burrow last October of his intention to retire. “That was a time I was just starting to say it out loud,” he admits. “It didn’t feel real. I was saying it out loud but it wasn’t registering that I was saying it. ‘Rob was saying it’s the right decision and it’s not worth it, and for a long time I was saying it but not believing it. I had to start saying it and coming to terms with it then. Especially saying it to Rob, someone you’ve shared those experiences with, and who knows the length of my career, and what I’ve been through and what I’ve done and not done. Saying to him I’m having to stop, as he had to, it was like saying goodbye to something that I wasn’t sure I was ready to say goodbye to.”  Ward says he has no regrets about devoting his early life to a sport that has left both physical and mental damage, but admits he is now grieving rugby league. “I’ve been grieving the game. Grieving the mission of what was there before me. "I got plunged into something that just wasn’t what I expected or desired and that’s what sometimes can happen in life. You get presented with something completely out of the blue. Another challenge you didn’t expect. “Grieving that job, that role. James Graham put it pretty well. He said he’s probably not going to miss playing the game but he’s going to miss the man he was playing that game. “    Speaking on episode 4 of the Transitions series of SOM Talks, Ward says he believes a career curtailed by illness and punctuated by injury has allowed him to build resilience through adversity. “It’s a big thing, self-doubt and self-sabotage. That’s when I woke up. To acknowledge self-doubt and self-sabotage and be aware of the triggers. I understood and saw that my mind could sometimes be my worst advisor and worst enemy. What can I do to make that unnecessary suffering less and less and go away? Accepting how you can feel takes you a long way to peace of mind, accepting situations and thoughts that you have, being aligned with your purpose, knowing your values and acting them out. I’ve been doing that as my mental health training regime.”    Ward now runs his own men’s mental fitness brand Mantality with the aim of bringing men together in boosting their wellbeing. “I meditate every day, practice gratitude every day, and created Mantality to have a group of men on that same wavelength. “My ‘why’ has shifted a lot in my life and that has had to do a lot with the injuries and turmoil I’ve gone through. I was on a bit of a cycle. I couldn’t real​ly change that cycle. So I had to change myself.”  SOM Talks is the official podcast from award-winning mental health and fitness charity State of Mind Sport. Hosted by George Riley, each episode explores themes in line with the unprecedented and unique challenges that we are individually and collectively facing right now.   The inaugural series explores Transitions – the mental health challenges associated with major life and career changes. SOM Talks is available on all major podcast platforms.

Former Super League star Matty Blythe says a radical career change has given him a perspective on life that he would otherwise never have achieved. The ex Bradford Bulls and Warrington favourite gave up his life as a professional sportsman aged just 28, to provide close security for bomb disposal experts in ISIS strongholds in Iraq. Opening up to host George Riley on the official SOM Talks podcast from award-winning mental fitness charity State of Mind Sport, Blythe revealed his extraordinary career change was the best thing he has ever done for his own mental health. “I hated playing, I hated rugby league at that time. I was way gone,” he said of the realisation something major in his life had to change. “Everyone goes through that part of their career. The biggest part of my character is smiling, and I was like that but it was completely false. And that was massively mentally draining, so I knew I needed something different in my life.” Blythe trained in hostile security whilst playing on as a pro with Warrington, despite having already made the decision that his heart and head were no longer in elite sport, with all its sacrifice, physical and mental strain. He then broke a leg in his final game. “It was difficult mentally to go through, and I ended up speaking to counsellors through State of Mind and Rugby League Cares to get through that. “For me my health is the greatest thing. I hated not feeling the way I wanted. It would have been pointless to carry on. I’m glad I have gone through this transitional period as it made me miles stronger. I’m proud of the person that I was when I was really good at playing rugby. And I’m proud of the person who thought it’s not the be all and end all, and there is life after rugby league. “Sometimes you just get to a crossroads where your head just goes I’m not enjoying myself, which way do I go? Do I carry on the way I’m going or do I change something along the path. It might be a long journey but it might be worth it when you get to your destination.” Blythe’s immediate journey out of rugby was one of the more remarkable tales of transition out of professional sport. His first assignment after completing his hostile environment and close security training was to fly to Baghdad. “I had 10 hours in Istanbul before Baghdad. I had a couple of pints as I knew that next flight was the one. Everything went through my mind. It was exactly like my first ever game, what if this or that goes wrong? It was draining, but as soon as I got there it was fine. “My first mission was on my birthday. We went to a factory where Isis had taken a stronghold. We did a massive belt of IED’s (improvised explosive devices) and I was being taught what to look for and what we might find. That day I went back and slept for 16 hours, I was gone, my head was drained.” Blythe spent two years in Iraq on a job full of adrenalin-filled highs and life-changing lows. “One of my best mates over there who I was with for 18 months got killed, trying to detonate an IED. I’d never experienced someone that close to me being killed, just like that. I told myself it was part of the job but I just didn’t know how to deal with it. I was angry and upset. I’m never going to see this guy again. That was the worst thing we went through. Iraq were having problem with other countries so things were happening, there was lockdown and indirect fire into camp. One of my drivers got killed who was a local national. But I loved the job and I would go back tomorrow.” SOM Talks is the official podcast from award-winning mental health and fitness charity State of Mind Sport. Hosted by George Riley, this inaugural series explores Transitions  - the mental health challenges associated with major life and career changes.