The league gets started ...

It seems like a long time since I have had a chance to sit down and write about everything that has been happening. 

I find myself almost 2 months into my 9 months in the UAE and finally everything is starting to feel more settled and familiar.  I am also staring to feel like I actually live here rather than I am just on an extended holiday!

League gets off to a good start!

Me with Norm and Joe for the first game of the EHL 2014

The league got off to a good start and we are now 15 games into the season.  It was great fun to work the first game of the league with two of my team – Norm and Joe.  Both have been really supportive of everything I have been implementing and they have a great sense of humour too so when I am getting too focussed or serious they bring me back to earth with a bump (as all my good friends have learnt to do over the years)!

Norm has continued to be a huge support to me and every-time I find myself needing to bounce some ideas around he is already there and one step ahead of me by asking the questions I have in my mind.  As I have gotten to know him and his wife Susan better it is clear that they are very open, generous and supportive people and provide stability and a place of comfort to a number of people who have moved to the UAE.  Without Norm here I would most definitely be struggling to settle in and so I feel very lucky to have met him and to have the chance to work with him.

The EHL is quite a difficult league to describe.  Each team has a real mix of talented players alongside some less experienced players and so whilst some of the games can be fast and challenging, others are less so.  Of the six teams, four of them are expat teams and then two of the teams are made up of locals and Emiratis with a couple of imports, but predominantly together they make up the UAE national team players.

In reality any team can win the league because of the unpredictable nature of the games and it all depends how well the teams will play on any given night.  It makes for an exciting league but also quite a challenge for assigning officials to games because you never know which games will be close and need a strong experienced crew, or which games will be less testing for the officials. 

The hockey infrastructure

I am starting to appreciate the job that the EIHA and IHUK have done over the years by putting in place a strong infrastructure for the development of officials.  It is quite easy to sit in London in my flat and criticise the EIHA for not doing something … but I never took the time to sit and appreciate everything they had already done or achieved.  By finding myself in a less developed programme I have come to appreciate what I didn’t even see before!

I have now set-up a supervision system for game officials.  My objective is to referee about 60% of the games in the EHL and for the other 40% or games to watch the other officials and provide them with detailed supervision so as a team we can grow and develop.  I looked at the IIHF supervision forms and programme, the EIHA forms and programme and the USA Hockey forms and programmes and brought together elements of each to create a programme that is fit for purpose and at the right level for the officials here in the UAE.  Whilst I am used to being supervised regularly, for many officials here what I have set-up has been new to them and so it has been a learning curve for me and for them on how this works and can be used as a tool to benefit us as a team.  I’ve enjoyed watching them work games and I also think from the discussions after the games that the officials are enjoying the fact that someone is watching them and focussing on what they are doing and how they can do it better.

Whilst I am here for the development of the officiating programme I have come to appreciate that this can only happen alongside a number of other areas.  I have started to regularly communicate with the coaches on behalf of the officiating team to ensure they are aware of areas of focus from a rule perspective but also anything that is not working for the league.  Alongside this I have come to realise that some of the off-ice officials have just taken on their roles without any training or guidance and whilst they are doing a great job, they too could benefit from some training specifically for off-ice officials.  Finally after setting up the Disciplinary Rules and Procedures for the league I have now started to use them and this too is another element that fits in with the officiating and I took for granted back home.  Back home I would do my job on the ice, enforce the rules, write-up match reports and send them off to discipline.  Here I am doing that and then coordinating the Disciplinary Committee, the communication to the teams and the logging of penalty statistics.

Whilst I am enjoying the chance to implement new systems and procedures and to help the league grow here, I now appreciate a lot more what is set-up back home.  I’ve asked for advice and help from Mike Hicks, Mohamed Ashraff and Allan Batchelder and all of them have been supporting me and sending me documents and advice to help me in setting everything up here.  I’ve also been using my international contacts in USA hockey because I noticed that a lot of the players come from North America where the rules are slightly different to IIHF.  With this in mind I sourced the rules cheat sheet which highlights the major differences and which a lot of the USA hockey officials use to help them switch to IIHF rules when they go to international tournaments.

So whilst many of you back home think I am just reffing a few games and lying on the beach in-between, I want to reassure you that yes that is happening but at the same time I am setting up lots of procedures to help the league grow, develop and operate. 

I often find myself up late after a game, writing a supervision report for one of the officials, or reviewing the game video to find clips for educational purposes, or writing up an incident report and setting up the video clip and procedure for disciplinary review.  There is always something to do and always more that could be done … and as most of you know I enjoy the never-ending challenges and tasks!

The officiating team

I am finding myself spending a lot of time on developing, educating and working with my team of officials.  I have an on-line portal, which not only helps me with assignments but also allows me to upload video clips and documents for them to all review.  Alongside that I have implemented a weekly fun rules quiz to help with rule knowledge (yes I did just put rules and fun in the same sentence).  I know at times I have been bombarding the guys with information – but they are a good bunch and all of them are being kind and humouring me … I think some of them are actually enjoying the rules fun quiz too!

I have planned a mid-season video analysis clinic where as a team we will come back together and review some clips from the season so far to help us all develop as officials for the league.  The mid-season video analysis clinic is in November, which is turning out to be a busy month as I will also be in Japan refereeing the Women’s World Championship Qualification Round for the IIHF and in Doha to help with the running of a Referee Clinic also for the IIHF!

The officiating team is really coming together and supporting each other which is great to see and the more I spend time with them all the more I realise that quite often the strongest teams involved in ice hockey are the officiating teams.  They go for many months without seeing each other or without all being together but they still manage to have a sense of belonging and a sense of team spirit.  I guess that is why I love being an official and I am always proud wherever I am in the world to pull on the stripes!

Potential of hockey in the UAE

I am actually finding it difficult not to get caught up in the vision of what hockey is and has the potential to be in the UAE. 

Dubai Mall ice rink

I often have to catch myself to remind myself where I am and how amazing it is that we have the quality we have and the amount of hockey we do in this country!  Quite often it is when I am sitting in the ice rink in the Dubai Mall (which is the largest shopping mall in the world).  Shops and extravagance and nice hotels surround me.  Outside it is 35degree plus heat … and yet I am part of an ice hockey programme that is leading the way within its region.

 

Atlantis Hotel on the Palm

I have scheduled catch-up calls with the IIHF each month to talk about how everything is working here.  From the IIHF perspective they see the hockey development in the UAE as a strong programme in the Asia region and one that is gaining momentum at a fast pace.  They are supportive of the set-up here and they also have set me challenges for what needs to be achieved from an officiating perspective.  One of the challenges is for me to find a local who can be the Referee Chief for the country.

It still amazing me that there are so many locals and Emiratis who are playing the game here.  In a country where ice is not the first thing that comes to mind there is a passion here for hockey that is addictive and infectious.  In fact it is quite humbling to witness the passion that the locals have for hockey – sometimes back home we forget what the game is about.  Back home there is so much surrounding hockey that gets in the way of what the game is all about – money, sponsors and ownership.  Here, every now and then, there is a glimpse of what hockey is about – the team spirit, the sense of belonging, the excitement of winning and the thrill of playing the fastest sport in the world.  To watch the locals play the game in front of their friends who are cheering them on with the same excitement of fans in the NHL is quite a surreal and yet emotional experience.

When I sit and watch what they have already created here through sheer passion for and love of the game, I feel privileged to be invited here to help. 

The EHL may be a mix of locals and expats but really I have come to see the real value of it is in promoting and growing the game of ice hockey here in the UAE … and that must never be forgotten in everything that is done in the league.

Super-cup day

It would be remiss of me not to mention Super-cup day!  Super-cup day was an idea of one of the locals that there should be one day that is a festival of hockey and celebrates all of the teams who won their respective leagues last season.

Media briefing for Supercup

This year was the first year it happened and it truly was a festival of hockey.  There were seven games throughout the day which involved the champions of each age group playing each other for the ‘Super-cup’: U9s, U12s, U15s, U18s, Local men’s league, ladies and EHL.  It was a long day of hockey that started at 8am and finished at 10pm that evening and the rink was buzzing all day with excited children and parents.  In the week leading up to the Super-cup day I was invited to attend a media briefing for one of the local TV stations alongside the mastermind behind the event and one of the officials who is a member of the EHL Management Board.  They both spoke in Arabic about the event and then asked me questions regarding the officiating and translated the answers.  It was a privilege to be invited to the media briefings and I even found my picture in one of the local papers which was quite fun … even if I could not understand what was written!

Local newspaper feature on the Supercup

There are junior teams here in UAE but the programme is not big and so they train throughout the year but there is no league for them to play in.  Their only games to play are during tournaments and so the super-cup day provided an extra opportunity for game experience for everyone.

Clearly alongside the EHL I am also responsible for assigning officials for junior tournaments and this has been a useful way of developing the new local officials alongside giving some of the more experienced officials slower games where they are able to practice some of the positioning that I have been giving them feedback about in the EHL games.

Supercup Trophy

We had a lot of officials working games throughout the day and it was a great team spirit as one crew finished their games and came back to the locker room to pass over the baton to the next crew of officials.  It reminded me of when I first started lining and I spent weekends officiating junior tournaments in Nottingham and other places with my Dad – learning the ropes of being a good official and enjoying the banter and friendship of other officials.

The super-cup day was a huge success and great fun to be a part of … I am looking forward to seeing it become an institution for hockey in the UAE.